The 62-year-old Valentine’s most-recent MLB gig was 10 years ago, when he finished in last place with an overpaid, aging Mets team (my apologies: “overpaid & aging” and “Mets team” is a redundancy). I admit to not being very familiar with Valentine’s managerial tactics. Neither is Dan Shaughnessy, it seems. However, that did not stop Danny Boy from penning an entire column on why Valentine is the right guy for the job.  Oh, sure, Dan mentions interesting tidbits, like the fact that Valentine is Ralph Branca’s son-in-law, and the fact that he has a cult following in Japan. Not much was said about Valetine’s actual track record and tendencies as a manager, though.

I think that I should be an astronaut. Why?  Well, I may or may not be a direct descendant of the Bourbon Kings of Naples, and I can belch really, rally loudly on command.  The above statement makes just about as much sense as much of Shaughnessy’s column promoting Valentine.  Here is the most memorable trait of Bobby Valentine: he once wore a Groucho Marx mask while hiding in the dugout after being ejected. It made Sportscenter.

Valentine is a pseudo-celebrity, and Dan’s one salient point is that this might help him in the leadership department. Players might be more prone to respect a guy with star power. While I can agree with that, there’s a whole lot more that should go into this type of analysis, and as of now, I haven’t read much else in the media’s argument for Valentine.

There are some direct way to go about doing this, such as offer a large contract to a notable MLB closer such as Ryan Madson (the guy who Papelbon is replacing in Philadelphia). However, as we’ve seen with Papelbon’s new contract, pitchers with an established reputation as a closer will demand top dollar in this free-agent market. Let’s face it, teams aren’t just paying for the numbers, they are paying for the “bulldog mentality” or whatever intangibles are supposedly inherent in a guy who can finish close baseball games on a nightly basis. The magnitude of impact that these intangibles have on performance (assuming they even exist) is quite debatable, which leads me to believe that this may be an area where a more savvy GM can save a bit of coin without sacrificing too much in terms of actual talent.

I’ve always been a strong supporter of two types of moves:

1. Acquiring a middle reliever with good peripheral numbers but little/no closer experience.
2. Attempting to convert an inconsistent starting pitcher with good “stuff” into a reliever.

Keeping in mind the fact that Scutaro celebrated his 36th birthday yesterday, the Sox will need to brace themselves for the inevitable plummit in productivity which may or may not occur next season.  The easy approach would be to use a loose RHP/LHP platoon with Lowrie, who hits left-hand pitching very well.  A more bold approach would be to kick the tires on free-agent superstar Jose Reyes, shop Lowrie, and use Scutaro as a utility infielder. This, of course, is less likely.

Other notes:

• In relation to my Reyes note above, the worst possible effect of the John Lackey / Carl Crawford contracts would be Red Sox management and ownership becoming irrationally gun shy on the free agent market. Even ignoring the strong possibility that Crawford turns things around next season, there have been many, many success stories resulting from teams taking on long-term risk in free agency. Consider where the Yankees would have been without C.C. Sabathia over the past few years, or the Cardinals without Matt Holliday. Or, the 2004-2007 Red Sox without one Manuel Aristides Ramirez.  We can only hope that Ben Cherington isn’t the reactionary type.
• The Sox begin interviewing candidates for the manager role today, starting with Phillies bench coach Pete Mackanin. My early wager is on DeMarlo Hale being promoted internally, but I suppose a lot of that will depend on the scope of the political fallout (if any) from Terry Francona’s departure.

From looking at his track record over the course of the last several years, it’s pretty clear that his durability and effectiveness have both been steadily deteriorating, at a relatively young age. He has had bouts of elbow discomfort in the past, so the TJS news isn’t exactly a bombshell.

I’m not happy with his 2011 performance, but I’m also not very comfortable with the way he’s treated here.  From Bob Stanley, to Jose Offerman, to Julio Lugo, and now Lackey…the angry mob mentality displayed by most of the fan base just isn’t my cup of tea.

Here’s hoping for a year of tranquility.

While the Red Sox clearly have their problems, the Oakland A’s have not had a winning season in 5 years.  I guess, sometimes, the low-hanging fruit tastes pretty sweet.

2011: “Oh my God, they were drinking beer and eating Popeye’s! How DARE they disrespect the game like that!  They clearly lost all of their desire to win! I want a full investigation into this!  WHY WON’T ANYBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!”

The point is: as always, it’s all about winning. Public opinion will be framed around the on-field result. Kevin Millar could have passed around a spoonful of black tar heroin during the 2004 ALCS, and the media would have found a positive spin on it.

Interestingly enough, in both 2004 and 2011, the team was one strike away from a very, very different media narrative.

Some other thoughts on BeerGate:

• I felt a little better about the situation when I heard that the Lester/Beckett/Lackey trio was drinking Bud Light. These guys weigh 250 lbs, they would have to drink a gallon of that swill to feel any sort of impairment. If anything, it quenched their thirst.
• A lot of people are more outraged over the rumor that the pitchers might have been drinking in the dugout, as opposed to the clubhouse. But really, why does it matter? The situation is the same: drinking during a game in which they were not scheduled to pitch. Is the dugout somehow more sacred than the clubhouse?  It certainly doesn’t look like it, with all of the sunflower seeds and tobacco spit on the floor.
• It appears that everyone is assuming Larry Lucchino leaked this story, but I don’t buy it. If there’s one thing Lucchino is not, it’s stupid. He wouldn’t create this sort of shitstorm over his own organization. My guess is that the source is much lower in paygrade, someone you’ve probably never heard of. A middle-management type, or perhaps even a clubhouse employee.
• The one thing that I am a tad outraged over is that it appears that (according to Jon Lester’s rundown on the situation) some of the team was treating Terry Francona like the blind substitute teacher in a 6th grade social studies class. Just walking all over him with little regard to authority. Francona has always had a laissez-faire style of leadership, but it seems as if some of the players were taking advantage of that.

For example, a relatively well-known local writer Tweeted this gem last week:

Clay Buchholz will throw off mound Monday despite feeling “stuff” in his back. It’s time for little camper Clay to buck up and pitch thru it

Now, baseball is not this particular writer’s forte, and the view from outsiders tends to be that the purveyors of our national pastime are “soft” in comparison to their mullet-headed ice skating cousins from the north. However, the statement doesn’t look any less idiotic when we are now faced with the news that Clay Buchholz has a stress fracture in his lower back, and his season is likely over.

In related news, the Sox did trade for left-handed starter Erik Bedard.  More on that (along with an updated prospect list) next.

Box Score

My apologies again for yet another prolonged absence. Yes, I realize that I’ve been making that same apology quite a bit lately. Without trying to sound too much like the aggressor in a domestic dispute: I promise it won’t happen again.

I’m going to change the WPA section a bit. Instead of listing the top 5 players in total WPA for each game, I’m going to list 1) the player with the highest WPA, 2) the player with the lowest WPA, and 3) the top three plays of the game.

Highlights:

Hero of the Game: Kevin Youkilis (1 for 3, HR, BB, 2 R)
Goat of the Game: Michael Pineda (4.1 IP, 8 H, 1 BB, 7 ER)

Top 3 Plays:
1) Youk’s 2-run HR in the 1st inning (.165 WPA)
2) Jarrod Saltalamacchia’s RBI single in the 1st inning (.131 WPA)
3) Salty throwing out Ichiro in the 5th (.083 WPA)

Quote of the Day:

 ”Days like this, the way guys are playing — it’s definitely what we signed up for.”

- Carl Crawford

Prospect Watch:

AA: OF/DH Chih-Hsien Chiang continues to tear a hole through Eastern League pitching, going 2 for 3 with 2 walks, 2 RBI, and 2 runs scored yesterday. He has a 1.357 OPS in his last 10 games, and 1.043 on the year.
SS A: In the bad news department, Garin Cecchini, a high-ceiling prospect who was having an impressive pro debut in Lowell, was hit by a pitch and suffered a broken wrist.  His 2011 season is most likely done.

Here are my 2011 All-Star rosters:

The names in blue are players I selected, but were left off of the real All-Star teams.  The names in grey are the final omissions from my All-Star squads, names that I had difficulty leaving out.  I did adhere to the mandatory representative rule, so every MLB team has an All-Star amongst my selections.

Now, let’s take a look at the scrubs; the guys who don’t deserve to be going to Phoenix for this year’s Mid-Summer Classic:

American League Scrubs:

1) Derek Jeter, SS, Yankees
No commentary is really needed.  It’s been said thousands of times before.  Jeter is a living, breathing example of a flawed system.  If he really did “respect the game” or whatever, he would gracefully bow out and allow a more deserving player to take in the festivities (there are about 5 other shortstops who fit this description).

2) Jose Valverde, RP, Tigers
In modern-day baseball, as a general rule, closers tend to be overrated and middle-relievers tend to be underrated.  The All-Star game is an annual reminder of this.  Jose Valverde averages 5 walks per 9 innings, and is the third-best reliever on his own team.  I could probably find at least 20 other relief pitchers in the American League who I’d rather call upon in a close situation.

3) Michael Young, DH, Rangers
I guess I just don’t understand the logic of choosing an actual DH to be the “backup DH” on your team, unless that DH happens to be the best hitter available for the spot (Young isn’t). I’d much rather have seen Konerko in this role.

National League Scrubs:

1) Chipper Jones, 3B, Braves
The Jeter selection is almost understandable, because he was chosen by idiots.  You don’t blame a dog for shitting in your yard, you just grab a plastic bag and deal with it.  This, however, is ridiculous.  An actual baseball person selected Chipper Jones to be an All-Star, in a year where he is one of the most unproductive third basemen in the league.  Yes, he’s a future Hall of Famer.  Yes, he deserves recognition for his play over the past 18 years.  But, this isn’t the proper forum for that.

2)  Jonny Venters, RP, Braves
Yeah, an ironic choice, given what I wrote about Jose Valverde.  Venters is a middle reliever who was chosen instead of the closer on his own team (Kimbrel) who is having a much more dominant season.  It looks like the selection was based upon ERA, and not much else.

3) Brian Wilson, RP, Giants
He’s a MLB poster boy, and he’ll probably go to a few more All-Star Games before his career is over, but 2011 hasn’t been a standout year for him.  There are a bunch of other more deserving pitchers.

Click here for the new rankings, or the link at the top of the page.

A couple of notes:

• Several players fell out of the top 25: pitcher Michael Bowden, catcher Dan Butler, and catcher Luis Exposito.
• Josh Reddick is on the list, however,  he recently passed the rookie threshold and is no longer a “prospect” by definition.  He’ll be off the list when I re-rank these again.