Red Sox stars blast manager Bobby Vale - 美國職棒

http://0rz.tw/Tjq9k

Exclusive: Red Sox stars blast manager Bobby Valentine in heated July meeting
with ownership

Boston Red Sox players blasted manager Bobby Valentine to owners John Henry
and Larry Lucchino during a heated meeting called after a text message was
sent by a group of frustrated players to the team and ownership in late July,
three sources familiar with the meeting told Yahoo! Sports.

襪襪球員在會議上向老闆抱怨8BV

The owners called the meeting for Boston's off-day in New York on July 26
after first baseman Adrian Gonzalez, texting on behalf of himself and some
teammates, aired their dissatisfaction with Valentine for embarrassing
starting pitcher Jon Lester by leaving him in to allow 11 runs during a July
22 start. It was the latest incident in a season's worth of bad relations
bubbling between Red Sox players and Valentine.

以阿岡為首

Gonzalez and Dustin Pedroia were among the most vocal in the meeting, in
which some players stated flatly they no longer wanted to play for Valentine,
the sources said. The tenor of the 2 p.m. meeting at The Palace hotel in New
York turned ugly almost immediately, according to the sources, whom Yahoo!
Sports granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about
internal matters.

阿岡和小派罵得最大聲 其他球員則說就是不想為8BV打球了

Not all of the Red Sox players attended the meeting, the sources said,
highlighting the chasm that exists not only between some players and
Valentine but among players in the clubhouse. The perception that Valentine
is being scapegoated unfairly to divert attention from mediocre performances
by star players exists among some players, according to sources.

有人認為8BV是明星球員表現平庸的代罪羔羊

Red Sox general manager Ben Cherington confirmed the meeting. Although he
declined to provide specifics about what was said, he told Yahoo! Sports:
"The intent of the meeting was to provide a forum for people to express
whatever frustration needed to be expressed at a time during the season when
things were not going exactly the way we wanted to on the field in hopes that
we could put whatever issues were there aside and focus on playing games the
rest of the season. That was the intent of the meeting. That was the focus of
ownership. It was a productive meeting.

Ben出來講官話: 這是有用的會議 球員可以表達挫折

"Since then, we have not gone on the run we were supposed to."

Ownership has not wavered in its support of Valentine since the meeting, and
the sources said players have accepted that Valentine will remain manager for
at least the rest of the season. The Red Sox doubled down on Valentine over
the last week despite the perception that his first year as Boston manager
has been an abject failure. Boston, with an opening day payroll of $173.2
million, is 57-59 and sits 11 games back of the first-place Yankees and 5½
behind the second wild card. The Red Sox's last sub-.500 season was in 1997.
Through a spokesman, the team and Valentine declined comment.

會議以來，高層沒動搖對8BV的支持，球員接受8BV至少會帶完本季。

襪襪戰績很爛。

Eight days ago, besieged by questions about Valentine's present and future,
Red Sox general manager Cherington told reporters: "Bobby is our manager, and
we're not considering anyone else. He's as committed to managing the team as
he ever has been, and we're committed to him and trying to do everything we
can to support him and make this work."

Ben力挺8BV：我們不考慮別人。

Henry emailed a statement to Boston media members that echoed the sentiment.
"To blame Bobby Valentine for the Red Sox being .500 at this point in the
season," he wrote, "is simply wrong."

Henry聲明：把襪襪現在勝率低於五成，怪在8BV身上是錯的。

Some of the Red Sox's biggest names disagree.

有些襪襪球員不同意。

Issues that have inflamed players range far and wide. Leaving in Lester, a
well-respected figure in the clubhouse, to get blasted for 11 runs and four
home runs against Toronto soured players already beaten down by Valentine's
managerial style. Valentine uttering "Nice inning, kid" to rookie third
baseman Will Middlebrooks after he made a defensive blunder – an episode to
which Valentine admitted on WEEI radio – only furthered the animus toward
the 62-year-old, who is managing in the major leagues for the first time
since 2002. Since spring training, players have chafed at Valentine's
careless – and occasionally self-serving – interactions with the Boston
media, which his predecessor, Terry Francona, handled adroitly.

"I don't think it's that uncommon for complaints to be made during the
season," Cherington told Yahoo! Sports. "I'm not going to comment
specifically on those complaints. Our owners felt, given where we were at
that time in the season, given the collective frustration, we had not
accomplished what we wanted to. It was time to get together and hash things
out. There were no ultimatums issued. There were concerns expressed. Some
very positive things expressed, too. We felt that it was an opportunity to
get things off people's chests and move forward."

From the beginning of the Red Sox's courtship of Valentine this offseason to
the double-barreled votes of confidence last week, the match of the
hard-nosed Bobby V with the laissez-faire Boston clubhouse seemed tenuous at
best. It has proven far worse, personified best perhaps by a picture
circulating around via text message, according to a fourth source.

A general lack of respect for Valentine has pervaded the clubhouse throughout
the season. It may have peaked two days after the meeting, on July 28, when
Francona entered the Red Sox's clubhouse as an ESPN analyst. He started
talking with Pedroia, his most strident loyalist. Other players soon joined
the conversation, which lingered for 45 minutes. Francona apologized the next
day.

The Red Sox's tumultuous year started with their collapse last September,
followed by the team declining to re-sign Francona. After general manager
Theo Epstein left to run the Chicago Cubs, Cherington, one of his assistants,
took control of the team – until Lucchino wrested the managerial hire from
him. Ownership picked Valentine and Cherington rubber-stamped it, hopeful the
organization could grow cohesive over the two-year span of Valentine's
contract.

Instead, the Red Sox have splintered, not a shock considering Valentine's
history of divide-and-conquer management. For all of his supposed strategic
genius, Valentine wore out his welcome managing the Texas Rangers and New
York Mets because of his willingness to napalm personal relationships. It led
to a decade-long exile from the major leagues, most of which he spent in
Japan.

Valentine returned no different a manager. He barely talks with some of the
coaches on his staff, several of whom remain Francona supporters. The trade
of Kevin Youkilis, the World Series fixture who first exposed fractures
between the players and Valentine, devolved into a public-relations mess.

Then there are the oddities, like Valentine devising a plan to never play
outfielder Carl Crawford more than four days in a row because of an elbow
that may need surgery, only to abandon the idea less than a week later.

Certainly the concoction of losing and an unfamiliar style has hurt
Valentine's standing with players. Ownership remains in Valentine's corner,
with Henry saying in his statement eight days ago: "We have been nothing but
supportive of him inside and outside the clubhouse."

The support, according to the sources, baffles those against Valentine, who
wonder why the meeting was called if it wasn't going to change anything.

高層支持8BV讓討厭8BV的球員困惑。既然啥都改變不了，召開會議有__用。

During the meeting, the players told Henry and Lucchino that part of the
disconnect comes from Valentine spending excessive time in his office.

He'll retreat there again tonight, when Boston takes on Baltimore at Camden
Yards, still wearing a Red Sox uniform, still running one of baseball's great
teams, survivor of a mutiny.

For now.


--