Goodbye Tek

Jason Varitek announced his retirement the other day. Sadly, his glory days were long gone, a good chunk of his goodwill burned up by his inability to throw out runners and his inability, despite the captain's C on his chest, to stop last year's dysfunctional collapse. But let's not dwell on the negatives. Let's remember Tek in the mid 2000s, a stellar catcher who could hit for power from both sides of the plate. A silent leader who speaks volumes when needed, as when he punched ARod in 2004. The guy behind the plate for four no-hitters. One of the guys who hit a home run in four consecutive at bats. Mr. stoic thunder thighs who made my wife swoon with his icy stare and monstrous legs.

I'll leave it for someone with a better command of baseball history to speak to his place in the game, although  hardballtalk.com uses the numbers to paint him a slightly above average catcher who had a few excellent years. Regardless, I'll always remember him as one of the players who turned me into a baseball fan, and who took me on an incredible journey that culminated in that World Series win on my birthday back in 2004.

Smooth sailing Tek.

Retiring as a Red Sox

Following up on Joel's post, I wanted to note how classy Tim Wakefield's retirement speech was, and that he really did mean what he said. Afterwards, Alex Speier of WEEI reported that:

According to Barry Mesiter, the agent for Tim Wakefield, the knuckleballer turned down four contract offers for this coming season -- including one guaranteed major league offer -- in order to either return for or retire as a Red Sox.

I just hope that Tex's retirement goes down like this. It's always hard to see your team's great players go to other teams in the twilight of their career. I myself am still scarred by the sight of Thurman Thomas playing one last sad season in Miami - Miami! - before calling it quits.

Related Posts: Tim Wakefield to Announce He Is Retiring

Tek is Gone. Just Face It.

I don't associate the great blogging at hardballtalk.com with trolling, so I was surprised to see a post yesterday called Why not let Jason Varitek manage the Red Sox?

There's a large number of reasons why this is a bad idea, some of which are touched upon in the post, but at the end of the day the reality is that he was the Captain of a team that self-destructed. Most of the players on that team will be back next year, so if the captain couldn't get them to play together last year, why would naming him the manager all of a sudden make a difference? And making a 40 year old catcher who couldn't throw out baserunners in his prime a player/manager idea is an idea so absurd i'm not even going to address it.

I like Tek - he's been a great player for the Red Sox. But he's played his last game with the team and if he manages a baseball team it will be at some point in the future.