If you were Bobby Valentine, who would you give the ball to in the ninth inning with a one-run lead? Most Red Sox fans would say tonight’s starting pitcher.

But Daniel Bard is a starter, not a closer. At least for now. It’s what the 26-year-old righty wants, and Red Sox management is committed to letting him follow that dream.

In the sunny late-winter days of Fort Myers, it was easy to picture Bard as a starter. The 6-foot-4-inch, 200-pound pitcher would step right into the back end of the rotation.

With John Lackey and Daisuke Matsuzaka recovering from Tommy John surgery, someone had to pitch.

Why not a hard thrower entering his prime baseball years? After all, the team had traded for Andrew Bailey and Mark Melancon, who combined for 44 saves last season.

All that’s changed now. Bailey is out for the majority of the season after undergoing thumb surgery, and Melancon is still trying to recover from taking two of Boston’s three losses in the disastrous opening weekend in Detroit.

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Alfredo Aceves was Valentine’s first choice to close after Bailey was injured, and is still barely holding onto that role. But Aceves, the team’s most reliable pitcher in the final days of last September’s epic collapse, was anything but reliable in Detroit.

He faced five Tiger hitters in a pair of ninth-inning appearances and allowed all five to reach base safely.

On Opening Day, he was on the mound for Austin Jackson’s walk-off single; on Sunday, he blew the save by giving up a three-run homer to Miguel Cabrera in the ninth, tying the game.

Two innings later, Melancon suffered the second Boston blown save of the day when Alex Avila hit a two-run walk-off homer.

Almost makes you miss the good old days of the “Closer by Committee.” But there’s no committee in the back end of the Sox bullpen. At least not yet.

Vincente Padilla and Franklin Morales combined for six scoreless relief innings on Sunday. Both may get consideration if Aceves continues to struggle.

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For the past six seasons, there has been no closer controversy in Boston. Jonathan Papelbon was an All-Star, compiling 219 saves for the Sox.

He also was durable, never going on the disabled list.

Papelbon may have been the best closer in team history, but Bard was considered the heir apparent.

He threw gas and was the key setup man for Papelbon. His eighth-inning role was supposed to be an apprenticeship of sorts, on-the-job training for his eventual evolution into the lock-down ninth-inning pitcher at the back end of the bullpen.

After watching two ninth-inning meltdowns in Detroit, Valentine has to be thinking about Bard’s return to the bullpen.

He has other options to start: Padilla was impressive in long relief, and Aaron Cook threw a complete-game (seven-inning) five-hit shutout for the PawSox on Saturday night.

Through no fault of his own, Bard might see his time as a starting pitcher come to a close after one start. Valentine thought he had other options to pitch the ninth inning, but those options are dwindling with every blown save.

Tom Caron is the studio host for Red Sox broadcasts on the New England Sports Network. His column appears in the Press Herald on Tuesdays.

 


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