My first Sox manager as a fan was the great Johnny Pesky. I always thought that Dick Williams was the gold standard, but Tito definitely is. We were blessed to have him.
Tito Francona Appreciation Thread
- Thread starter Bergs
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I’ll never forget when I met him at the Cleveland airport in 2013 on the day his book with CHB hit the shelves. I saw him looking at t-shirts in some random store, booked it to the nearest Hudson Books or whatever, bought the book, borrowed a pen from the cashier and found him staring at the same rack of shirts. He had no idea the book was even out, signed it, exchanged some pleasantries and thanks for the WS, and then he asked me not to blow his cover.
Thanks for everything, Tito.
Thanks for everything, Tito.
The "word on the street" at the time was that he lost the clubhouse. So the team decided not pick up his options.
Looking back, as big as the colapse of 2011 was, and he really had no healthy picthers and a torn bullpen. I remember Aceves pithcing almost every day, and yes Lackey had a torn elbow.
And yet... they were alive on the last day and at one point were beating the Orioles and the Yankees were beating the Rays which meant they made the WC. Then the Rays improbably came all the way back and Papelbon blew the game and Crawford blew the catch and we know the rest.
All the scandals and stories that came after, chicken and beer, the Tito popping pills, Adrian Gonzalez saying G-d did not want the Sox in the playoffs, too many night games, etc. added fuel to the fire and management had to do something.
BTW I disagree that they won 69 games with the same team. It started similarily but Bard was tried as a starter, Papi was hurt, Crawford was lost to injury (no big loss I know) and then they made the Punto trade.
I do agree with joke manager. I really wanted to like Valentine as a manager. Lasted maybe a week.
This just showed up on my Xitter feed. I couldn't find it on MLB.com. Well done
View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1707764137634255356
View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1707764137634255356
Tito came to Cleveland when they were at their lowest point since revitalizing the franchise in the early 1990s. At that point, they were coming off four consecutive losing seasons, with three of those including 93+ losses. They hadn't had a winning season since they imploded in the 2007 playoffs. Their stars were either leaving (CC Sabathia, Cliff Lee and Victor Martinez had all been traded during their walk year) or breaking down (Grady Sizemore, Travis Hafner) or just didn't turn out to be that good (Faustberto Carmandez). The Dolans were always cheap, but when they did spend a little, it immediately blew up in their faces and crippled the payroll flexibility (Kerry Wood as closer and Pronk's extension). I – and I think most Tribe fans – had a hard time believing one of the game's best managers would choose to come to a small market where ownership couldn't or wouldn't support a perennial winner. He legitimized Cleveland as a place where players wanted to play again for the first time in a decade.
Granted, that first wave of veterans under him was a swing and a miss (Nick Swisher, Michael Bourn, Jason Giambi), but they put up a winning season 9 out of 11 years and never finished with fewer than 80 wins until this year. While the front office might bring in the personnel, I don't think there's been anyone over the past several decades who could manage a clubhouse and build a positive culture on a team better than Tito... even if his exit from Boston was painted otherwise. Cleveland has only had two managers I'd consider good in the nearly 40 years I've followed them (though both were really good), but Mike Hargrove had to put out a lot of fires in the locker room that never seemed to develop under Tito. Hell, Eric Wedge was basically an arsonist himself.
Granted, that first wave of veterans under him was a swing and a miss (Nick Swisher, Michael Bourn, Jason Giambi), but they put up a winning season 9 out of 11 years and never finished with fewer than 80 wins until this year. While the front office might bring in the personnel, I don't think there's been anyone over the past several decades who could manage a clubhouse and build a positive culture on a team better than Tito... even if his exit from Boston was painted otherwise. Cleveland has only had two managers I'd consider good in the nearly 40 years I've followed them (though both were really good), but Mike Hargrove had to put out a lot of fires in the locker room that never seemed to develop under Tito. Hell, Eric Wedge was basically an arsonist himself.