LVSoxFan

If I may point out one mistake everybody's making it's that if you accept that everything Cowley's writing is simply Ozzie's side of the story... that doesn't mean this verifies KW's side of the story. A being untrue =/= B is true. I think it's all somewhere in the middle. If I had to guess, based on my limited knowledge (compared to some of you here), it went like this: -Ozzie gets hired, and look how much fun it is to have this wacky loose cannon as a manager! -Not only that, he ends the WS drought in only his second year! He's a genius! -Guess that genius only lasted another 1/2 a season, considering the 2006 team on paper was even better than 2005 -After a few years, that wacky/loose cannon schtick became something players tuned out -Now that the team isn't so stellar, while both took credit for the World Series, both started maneuvering to escape credit for the mediocrity. Let the games begin. -The stuff with Ozzie's family seemed to have been the final straw for KW; as Milkman pointed out, in their view there's only one reality: what Ozzie says is reality. I doubt apologies were forthcoming. -So then it became "stay together for the kids" (aka the team), which of course never works. And makes the kids more miserable, in fact. -Like in any ugly divorce, you had both parents trying to now turn the kids (us, the media, the team) against the other one. For us, it just got old. For the team, as was said, when you've got your manager in the middle of the crucial Detroit series making contract demands, it killed whatever fight they had left My baseball geek co-worker said years ago the team had tuned Ozzie out, he had lost them. It's hard to disagree. It's a pretty fine line trying to be one of the guys yet somebody they accept as their superior/leader. Either way here we are. The reason Ozzie's firing back via Cowley and KW's going on WGN is because neither of them is acting like a freakin professional, something they haven't done for years. KW just can't let things go (remember the Frank Thomas "idiot" comment back in 2006?). Speaking of Frank, have you ever seen the WS DVD where during the interviews he refers to Ozzie as a "loose cannon" like two or three times? He says it like he can't believe this kind of crap from a manager whereas the other players praise him. Maybe Frank saw what was coming, LOL...

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 7, 2011 -> 10:52 AM) There is no doubt in my mind they both spent the summer trying to hang each other. None. +1 As I mentioned in that thread I started, I think this war started when KW publicly threw Ozzie under the bus (to use his term) for Jim Thome not coming back. I remember thinking: what the hell just happened here? And it was during Soxfest, if I recall! But yeah, it would bubble up when Ozzie would continually play Rios/Dunn for no apparent reason and then of course with the infamous (even I was like WTF?! and I don't second-guess managers a lot) Dunn Pinch-Hits for Lilly debacle. In fact, now that I think about it with these two, I could easily see how KW rubbed the DH-by-committee in Ozzie's face, which is why Ozzie took every opportunity to rub Your Big Signing No-Hitting DH right back in his. I think the team was simply a prop in a war between these two. No wonder 2011 sucked.

That's what I'm getting at Milkman: his sources are either Ozzie or one of the kids, if I had to guess.

I heard KW with Pat on WGN this morning and was like: wow. Man what is it with Cowley and Ozzie/KW? Is Ozzie paying him? I read the Cowley column and he kept quoting "major league sources" and all I could think of was: WHAT major league sources? Who outside of the Sox would know WTF is going on between Ozzie/Coop/KW? That said, Coop has been the one guy throughout all this that has been... consistent. His work speaks for itself.

Wow you guys really think we won't see Floyd OR Danks back? We better be getting somebody REALLY good for them.

I'm starting to warm up to this idea of LaRussa trying to right the ship for a couple of years and then we'll look to the future. Since we're stuck with Dunn, for example.

I highly, highly doubt JR issued a directive to KW: sign Adam Dunn, dammit! In fact, I seem to recall KW talking about he had to go talk to the old man first about this, since we were now going "all-in", salary-wise.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 30, 2011 -> 12:32 PM) Jerry Manuel said hi. Okay I said low-key, not flatlining. Good point. Although is anybody else noticing how KW is escaping all blame for this in the media? I mean, in Beantown right now it's pretty much a given that Tito AND Epstein are on the way out.

Boston's just a lose/lose proposition, pressure-wise. Not unlike the Cubs. When you're up, the fans love you but when you're down, they are absolute savages. I agree his personality could be just what the doctor ordered. Confession: for the past couple of years I would look at people like Gardy in Minnesota or Leland in Detroit and think: I wonder what it's like to have a stoic, low-key manager who's not a loose cannon? Because those teams don't seem to have the drama (and they kick our asses all over the place). Anyone ever feel that way before, too?

Well done Wedge. Although I wouldn't pin the 2011 on him from what we're reading. Sounds like that team had more than a few cancers and crybabies. I think the strike about the collapse is that it took so much out of him he may well need a break for a couple of years.

QUOTE (JohnCangelosi @ Sep 28, 2011 -> 02:30 PM) Doesn't part of the decision figure into who will be Kenny's "yes man" and won't rock the boat? I don't see Martinez being that guy... Granted I'm jaded, but aren't we all kidding ourselves here? Do we really think that KW, after years of enduring a wildman manager with whom his relationship soured at least 4 years ago, will be looking for anything BUT a yes-man? After the Ozzie Experience, I think most people--especially with KW's gargantuan ego--is going to do everything in his power to bring in somebody who will NOT rock the boat. This is basic workplace psychology. Unless KW tries that and JR has somebody else in mind and bigfoots KW.

Wow is it April 2011 already?

That Ozzie had changed over recent years, the clubhouse didn't respond to the way he became, and that he thought the timing of his contract extension request a few months ago derailed any momentum the team had. FWIW my co-worker and many here have been saying this for years. I would wonder out loud how you go from WS champion to 1/2 a good year and then to corpseball, as so many here have referred to it. And he would say, as others have, that Ozzie's "style" wore off after '05--that players were tuning him out and that's the death of any team. Maybe all that loose cannon stuff was a novelty in '04/'05, but clearly the team was not responding to him. To hear HAWK of all people blurt that out just confirms it. And Paulie, in the locker room last night, he did not seem one IOTA regretful that Ozzie was gone. I thought that was deafening, that reaction.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 27, 2011 -> 03:01 PM) What Paul Konerko had to say, said it all. I caught that too. What did Hawk say?

Why do I think that now it's all over in the coming weeks we're going to hear more and more about how that clubhouse really was and what players really thought of him?

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Sep 27, 2011 -> 02:06 PM) Guillen had to go, but how in the heck do you appoint Cora the interim manager last night and this morning Williams texts him not to show up tonight. What an embarrassment. Kenny Williams needs to get his act together. What? What a dick move!

Was anybody else completely turned off/disgusted by Ozzie's comments (in the Trib) about how all he cared about at this stage was money and more money? Literally saying f*** the ring, he wants to get paid? Wow, Marlins management must be excited to hear that, paying him $4 million a year. Not: I want to win, or I want to EARN my big money, just... yup... wait for it.... SHOW ME THE MONEY. For those comments alone he should be gone and, as one columnist pointed out: Ozzie didn't get fired, he quit.

It's hard for me to feel optimistic when Rios and Dunn are on the team, no matter who else remains. The only upside for me is hey, at least Walker's gone FINALLY--and that may bode well for Beckham. Too many question marks right now and let's face it: KW is still here.

Can we add a poll to this because I'd love to see overall who everybody wants to manage the Sox, and not just who's rumored.

All-time favorite Sox player, period. I hope this isn't the last year for him.

That's why I have such doomsday feeling about 2012 that I can't remember having before. I feel like I've been watching the same result for three years but this time it seems to be a foregone result for next year because we can't get rid of Rios or Dunn. And here we have KW drinking some home-brewed Koolaid. So even the wait-till-next-year optimism that usually sets in right about now is already snuffed.

This wins my award for Worst. Rationalization. Ever. Seriously. Hey, we've been in first place a lot? So WHAT? I often wonder if Minny's manager is on the hot seat because they always win the division then get smooshed in the playoffs. But hell at least they make it THAT far. But here we have our main decision-maker declaring that he's winning, duh, because the team that hasn't made the playoffs in three years sorta/kinda/maybe looked like they could have depending on what part of the season we're talking about? *facepalm* BTW I'm sure most of you recall that KW in 2005 was totally clear in what the goal was: win the division. Win, that, and take everything after as it comes. Now we have this same guy saying THIS is his standard? He should be released for this comment alone. He's lost it. If he ever had it.

My all-time favorite Sox player, period. I had the honor of being at his perfect game, a memory which most people will never get to experience.

Man do you remember the first week of games at Cleveland? Not Opening Day, but after? That place was so empty even I was sad for how far they had fallen, fan-wise. Hopefully that trend is reversed.

You mean like a stage parent kind of thing?