Scott Cordischi On Sports: The Final Straw!
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
How bad have things gotten for the Boston Red Sox? Once considered a model franchise with two World Series titles under their belt last decade, they are now nothing more than a punch line and a sorry excuse for what $174 million can buy these days.
The latest revelation to come out of the soap opera “As The Baseball Turns” is a report on Yahoo! Sports that claims a secret meeting between players and ownership took place last month where the players were highly critical of manager Bobby Valentine.
The report stated that the meeting was prompted by a text sent from Adrian Gonzalez to ownership on behalf of himself and his fellow teammates. Among the things they were upset about was Valentine’s decision to leave Jon Lester in a game on July 22nd where the lefthander gave up 11 runs in 4 innings of work.
The report also says that Gonzalez and Dustin Pedroia were among the most vocal players in their disdain for Valentine and his managerial approach. Team owner John Henry and team president Larry Lucchino listened to the players complaints at a hotel in New York on an off day before the team opened up a weekend series with the Yankees.
Where do we begin to criticize?
Let’s start with ownership. Why Henry and Lucchino would agree to such a meeting is beyond me. And, at the very least, what Tweedledee and Tweedledum should have said to the players once they aired their grievances about playing for Valentine was, “why don’t all of you overpaid, underperforming cry babies just shut your pie holes and start doing your jobs? Let’s not forget that you cost Terry Francona his job with your poor play and poor attitudes last September thereby forfeiting your right to have any say into who we hire as manager. That’s it! Meeting adjourned!”
Now let’s talk about the players. Was it Bobby Valentine who embarrassed Jon Lester by leaving him in too long against the Toronto Blue Jays last month or was it Lester who embarrassed himself, Valentine, the organization and all of Red Sox Nation by giving up 11 earned runs against a last place team at home, no-less?
Then there’s Gonzalez, Pedroia and the rest of the cry babies. I would expect a little more personal accountability from a player like Gonzo who signed a 7-year deal worth $154 million with the Red Sox. $22 million per season should not only buy the Red Sox much better production than what Gonzalez has given them to date, it should also buy at least a small amount of leadership as well.
And then there’s the fraud that is Dustin Pedroia. We’re all supposed to love little Peedie! He such a hard-nosed, get your uniform dirty overachieving leader, right? If only it were that simple. For someone who is supposed to be a leader in the clubhouse, he has been just the opposite. Instead of supporting his manager this season, he has done everything he can to undermine him. Instead of meeting with Valentine behind closed doors to discuss any issues he may have with him, he has publicly disrespected him by criticizing him through the media and by whining to ownership about him. Some leader!
The 2012 Boston Red Sox are a classic example of the inmates running the asylum and apparently ownership is either too dumb or too distracted with other business ventures to do anything about it.
Thank God for the Patriots!
-I thought that “Festivus” was the time for the airing of grievances?
-I didn’t think that it was possible for Chad (please don’t call me Ocho Cinco) Johnson to contribute less to the Miami Dolphins than he did to the Patriots, but he did. And now his head-butted wife Evelyn Lozada has filed for divorce.
-China may do well in sports like gymnastics and diving, but they can’t hold a candle to the United States in track and field.
-But they did make some snazzy Polo-brand outfits for Team USA.
-While I agree with new republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan’s philosophy of making the tough decisions today as opposed to kicking the can down the road, I believe that Mitt Romney’s decision to add him to the ticket amounts to political suicide. Seniors are traditionally the most loyal voters who show up to the polls in great numbers each November and the fact that Ryan has proposed to drastically cut Medicare by creating a voucher system will probably scare most of them to vote for Obama to serve a second term.
-With all of the money the NFL and its teams rake in each year, you would think that they would be able to provide bigger beds for their players during training camp than the small dormitory beds that the defending Super Bowl champion New York Giants are complaining about at the University of Albany.
-Let’s see if I have this right. The Oakland A’s ($55 million) and the Pittsburgh Pirates ($63 Million) both have payrolls roughly one-third the size of Boston yet both teams are right there in the hunt for a playoff spot while the Red Sox allow their overpaid players whine to ownership about their manager. Is that about right?
-One preseason game does not a career make, but you had to like what you saw from rookie first round draft choice Chandler Jones last Thursday night against the New Orleans Saints. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Jones is from my alma mater Syracuse University.
-Some believe that if Jones continues to perform well, that New England will not consider resigning defensive end Andre Carter who led the team in sacks last season before getting injured. I say, bring back Carter and have he and Jones as bookend pass rushers in the 4-3 alignment.
-Friar fans, Providence College has not yet appealed to the NCAA to get Sidiki Johnson eligible to play first semester this season. The school is reportedly looking into whether or not it is worth their while to file an appeal or to simply wait for him to become eligible come second semester in December. Apparently the NCAA is normally reluctant to grant an appeal like the one that would have to be made on behalf of Johnson because they do not want schools coming out of the woodwork using injuries, illness or other excuses to try to squeeze more eligibility out for them.
-And, word is that everyone believes that fab frosh Kris Dunn will be able to play sometime this season for the Friars. Some have questioned whether or not it would be worth burning a year of eligibility for Dunn if he were only able to return for 10 or so games this season. I say, why not? In this day and age, highly-touted players like Dunn rarely stay 5 years to play 4 at a school to you may as well get as many games out of him as you can while he’s wearing black and white.
-RIP Johnny Pesky, a class act who loved the Boston Red Sox organization. This current team is the antithesis of all that Pesky stood for.
-The fact that the Big East Conference hired CBS executive vice president Mike Aresco to be the new conference commissioner tells you all you need to know about what the league is thinking. Aresco was in charge of negotiating the network’s deals with the NCAA for the men’s basketball tournament as well as a mega-15-year deal with the Southeastern Conference. The conference will be negotiating a new television contract for football and basketball this fall despite the impending losses of Syracuse and Pittsburgh to the ACC.
-Part of me would love for Bobby Valentine to tell Red Sox players and owners to “take this job and shove it,” but that would be letting the players win. I said it before and I’ll say it again. Bobby Valentine is becoming more of a sympathetic figure as the season wears on and I find myself more and more in his corner.
-Did Mike Tannenbaum, Rex Ryan and the Jets not watch the Patriots’ dismantling of Tim Tebow and the Denver Broncos in the AFC Divisional playoff game last winter?
-With the way that the Orioles, Red Sox and Cubs have played this year, Dan Duquette is looking like he may have had a lot more to do with Boston’s world championships in 2004 and 2007 than boy wonder Theo Epstein did.
-I think that I’ll text the owner of GoLocalProv.com to request a meeting to tell him that I’m overworked and underpaid.
Comments:
Howard Miller
1:39pm on Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Scott i agree with everything you said, however Bobby V. is not the right manager for this day and age like it or not if you are paying a player millions pf dollars ( per year) it is impossible in most cases to motivate him by thrating him I remember the old days when Rico Petrecilli talked about when the season ended he went right ot his off season work like it or not those days are over
Scott Cordischi
12:08am on Thursday, August 16, 2012
Howard:
Sadly, you are correct! Today's pro athletes are so overpaid and pampered and old school techniques no longer motivate them. I guess this is supposed to be progress?