Time to say thanks for job well done

ST. LOUIS -- The manager is an afterthought, buried under the avalanche of publicity generated by his courageous, gimpy pitcher; his charming, devastating designated hitter; his forthright, charismatic, long-haired center fielder. Every day this march to the World Series has produced a new story or a new hero. There's Manny Ramirez, finally hitting a home run. There's Pedro Martinez, spinning a magical postseason shutout. Did you see Orlando Cabrera turn that double play? What will the young genius, Theo Epstein, do once the Red Sox win a championship?

Perhaps the more pertinent question is: will the critics finally ease up on Terry Francona now that his team has won it all?

Francona has been battered for leaving his pitchers in too long, for taking his pitchers out too soon, for not enforcing enough clubhouse rules, for enforcing Bill James's numbers too literally, for chewing too much tobacco (and more recently, a monstrous wad of Bazooka gum), and for not chewing out his players enough.

"I think Terry has taken more heat -- except for one game -- than [former Sox manager] Grady Little ever did," Red Sox owner John W. Henry declared last night. "When you are talking about the manager, if we disagree with a decision he's made, and it works, we say, `Oh well, that's why I don't manage.' But if it doesn't work out, we feel the right to criticize, and to be negative.

"A manager makes over 100 decisions a day. And he gets no leeway."

Managing the Red Sox has long been a thankless job that eats up lifelong baseball men and spits them into the dirt. Dick Williams, Don Zimmer, John McNamara, Kevin Kennedy, and Little all left town bitter and disillusioned. People have long maintained if any one of them had brought a championship to the city, they'd be deified.

We'll see. Even as Francona positioned his team to complete the most remarkable run in postseason history, there are still doubters who insist Francona is like former Celtics coach K.C. Jones, a nice man who was lucky to be coaching a roster loaded with talent. That characterization has never been fair to K.C., and it won't be fair to Francona, either.

"I was thinking about him the other night," Henry said. "Jason Varitek was batting fifth, and he came up with a big hit [a two-out triple in Game 2], but no one gave [Francona] any credit for switching him in the order."

Francona has steadily maintained he cannot worry about what people say about him, whether it's the fans or the media. Most of the time he's seemed impervious to the barbs.

"At least outwardly," said Henry, "but I don't think any human being can totally shut out constant criticism in the city where he works. It's tough."

Because he has relaxed regulations in the clubhouse, allowing loud music, bad hairstyles, and free-wheeling behavior, Francona has maintained the support of most of his players. Although he has privately been unhappy on a number of occasions with the way Pedro Martinez abuses the freedom the team has been given, for the most part he has allowed his team's personality to flourish, and enjoys its fun-loving nature. In return, his players have done what's been asked of them between the lines.

"He's prepared us very well for this," said pitcher Tim Wakefield. "He's gotten the best out of every player. I've always said the manager's job is the hardest one because you've got to deal with 25 personalities. He's done a great job of that."

It's not as if the manager can't relate. He, too, was a young ballplayer once. He, too, had flowing hair down to his shoulders as a freshman at Arizona, before his coach asked him to cut it. Maybe that's why the whole "idiots" mantra rings true with him. He has his crazy stories to share of his playing days, but when he took the field, he never let it get in the way of his performance.

Through the highs and lows of this postseason blitz, Francona has heard from a number of his former colleagues, teammates, and coaches. During the particularly rough patches, they have been a welcome distraction.

"I've gotten a lot of nice calls," he said. "During the Yankees series I got a lot of `hang in theres,' things like that."

He is human, and you know the second-guessing stings. It can also create doubt, but Francona's circle of baseball friends have proved to be excellent sounding boards and voices of support.

"I've heard from [Oakland manager Ken] Macha a lot," he said. "[Cleveland bench coach] Buddy Bell, too. Buddy Bell was responsible for me getting into coaching. He asked me in the winter of '90 if I wanted to be a manager in the minor leagues for the White Sox. I told him no, because I had three surgeries that winter, and I wanted to try to play, because I worked hard."

Baseball has been his life and his passion. He is not perfect, but he has done enough right to outlast Mike Scioscia, Joe Torre, and Tony La Russa.

Francona's way of handling criticism is to beat people to the punch. He's often self-effacing about his playing days, and likes to poke fun at his "lack of intelligence."

There are three words that have been foreign to Red Sox fans for nearly a century: World Series Champions. The manager brought those words to life, and deserves his piece of the credit. One thing has always been true about the hard-line Red Sox Nation: you are judged by your results. Terry Francona's results should speak for themselves.