BOSTON — In the end, Dave Dombrowski didn’t want to waste any time.
Tuesday afternoon, just hours after the Boston Red Sox were swept from the postseason by the Cleveland Indians, Boston’s president of baseball operations put uncertainty to rest.
He would be bringing John Farrell back as the team’s manager in 2017.
“He has the respect of the clubhouse,” Dombrowski said. “We played hard. I thought we had a good season. We won the division title.”
A good season, yes. A championship season? No. The Sox were eliminated from the playoffs in a three-game sweep for the first time since 2009. They were out-hit, out-pitched, and – yes – out-managed in the American League Division Series.
The decision wasn’t met with universal approval. Many fans have been outspoken about their unhappiness with Farrell’s ability to make the right moves. One Boston radio station said 80 percent of listeners responding to a poll wanted Farrell gone.
“I don’t feel that in-game strategy is the biggest thing as a manager,” said Dombrowski. “I think it’s important, but there are other things that are probably more important.
“As I’ve often told managers, to me the most important thing for a manager is that their club plays up to its capabilities day in and day out, which means that they’re communicating with their players and they’re getting everything that they can and their club is playing hard.”
The Sox played hard enough to win the division in 2016. In fact, they’ve won two AL East titles in four years under Farrell. Boston had won two in the previous 22 years. They were the first team in MLB history to go from worst-to-first twice in five years, a stretch that began with Farrell leading the Sox to a championship in his first season, 2013.
Around here, division titles aren’t enough. Boston considers itself the City of Champions, and anything short of a championship is a failure. Especially three straight losses to a team managed by Terry Francona, a Boston icon.
The Red Sox hold an option on Farrell’s contract for 2018, and Dombrowski said that he would discuss the status of his manager beyond next season with team ownership. On Tuesday, he wanted Farrell – and the world – to know the organization was happy with the manager’s performance in spite of what happened over the past two weeks.
It was a two-week span that saw the Sox fall from the heights of an 11-game winning streak to the lows of a playoff sweep. A steep fall indeed, but in the end it wasn’t enough to make Farrell the fall guy.
It’s a natural reaction for fans to want a change after a disappointing end to a season. Truth is, there isn’t much Farrell could do to change his team’s fate in the playoffs. The Sox scored more runs than any other team this season, but went ice cold against the Indians. His three starting pitchers combined to throw 112/3 innings – not one of them making it through the fifth inning.
Even the legendary Casey Stengel couldn’t win with that kind of pitching and hitting. The players, not Farrell, were responsible for this postseason failure. He managed well enough to bring Boston back to the playoffs for the first time in three years.
He’ll get a chance to bring them back there in 2017.
Tom Caron is a studio host for the Red Sox broadcast on NESN. His column appears in the Portland Press Herald on Tuesdays.
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