Quote of the Day (evaluating managers...)

Managing a baseball team is not an easy job. Like an iceberg, there's a lot of it that's invisible to the observer, below the surface. A bad manager can win with a good team (unlike football) and a good manager can't win with a bad team. There's a lot of debate flowing in certain sections of Red Sox nation about Terry Francona. There's a crowd that seizes on every possible tactical error, and every move that doesn't work, whether it was a mistake or not, and says things like "they're better off when he doesn't make any moves." There are others who respond with "they won the World Series last year," which proves, of course, that they won the World Series last year, and not much beyond that.

I think Francona's done a pretty good job. I also think that he's made his fair share of mistakes. The problem in evaluating the job comes from this - anyone who's making a list of tactical faults can compile his list, and a defender cannot compile a corresponding list of tactically brilliant moves - there's no such thing in a baseball game. There are moves that are by-the-book, and moves that are against-the-book, and the ones that work fade to invisibility, while the mistakes take on a neon-glow.

All of which leads me to the quote of the day. The best quote I've ever seen related to the issue of evaluating baseball managers. And the quotee never saw a baseball game, indeed, he pre-dated the game. (In the quote, replace the word "author" with "coach", and "lexicographer" with "manager"...)


"Every other author may aspire to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach."
- Samuel Johnson