Larry Brown Sports

Say what you will about Bobby Valentine and his inability to hold a job in professional baseball, but the man clearly has a sense of humor. Valentine’s career with the Boston Red Sox lasted about as long as most of us expected and went about as well as we would have imagined, so he decided to take a safer job as the athletic director at Sacred Heart University this year. It would also appear that he is making a few bucks from CBS Sports.

When you have been fired as many times as Bobby V. has, it becomes a punchline. And what do companies do with punchlines? They turn them into advertisements, which is why CBSSports.com has decided to feature Valentine in a fantasy baseball commercial. As you can see, the advertisement is dedicated to Bobby V. basically heckling himself for being fired so frequently throughout his career. It’s hilarious.

“I know, I’m fired.”

Talk about having no shame in your game. Valentine may say stupid things that inhibit his ability to land new jobs, but he still has his marketability.

Bobby Valentine had a shaky relationship with the Boston media while serving as manager of the Red Sox, and it looks like his tenure at Sacred Heart University is getting off to a similar start.

Valentine was introduced Tuesday as the new athletic director at the small Connecticut college. He took some questions from the media and was promptly grilled.

“Bobby, at this point in your life, why do you want to be an athletic director at Sacred Heart and some people think this is kind of a joke, what can you say about people not taking you seriously as athletic director here?” he was asked.

Valentine said the question came from the reporter who broke the story of his hiring, which was Bill Paxton of the Connecticut Post (Paxton was also identified as the reporter in question by one of his colleagues).

Valentine clearly took offense to the question.

“I really didn’t think I would be insulted with the first question, but what the hell, I guess that’s the way it goes,” he responded.

Valentine says he is looking forward to the new challenge. He also is making headlines for defending the job he did with the Sox last season. He was fired after the team went 69-93.

Bobby Valentine has taken a job as the athletic director at Sacred Heart University in Connecticut, and he he is looking forward to turning the page and forgetting about the abysmal season he endured with the Boston Red Sox last year. It’s a strange decision for a strange man, but Valentine apparently wanted to add NCAA athletic director to his resume that already includes managing professionally and color commentary.

On Monday, Steve Buckley of the Boston Herald spoke with Valentine about his new gig. However, Bobby V. had no interest in entertaining questions about his 69-win season in Boston.

“I don’t want to comment on stupid things that stupid people say,” he said. “I’m not going to comment on any of that.”

When asked if he was going to miss baseball, Valentine did what he has become an expert with in pulling the sympathy card.

“I won’t miss some of the stuff I had to deal with last year, that’s for sure,” he replied. “We have a baseball team (at Sacred Heart).”

But that’s not the best stuff Valentine has said this week. On Tuesday, Sacred Heart officially introduced their new AD, and naturally there were more questions about the Red Sox. Valentine got into a bit more detail this time, even giving himself a pat on the back for the job he did managing the team.

“I thought I did a hell of a job in Boston,” he told reporters, via WEEI.com. “I thought what had to be done there was done except for winning a pennant. But Connie Mack wasn’t going to win with that team. It’s six months of a 62-year life. It’s six months of a 42-year career in baseball. It’s a blip, a little spot on the radar, as far as I’m concerned.”

What had to be done there is done? Apparently the Red Sox had to go through a 69-win season in order to move forward. Valentine may be right that no manager was going to win with the 2012 Red Sox, but I certainly would not say he did a “hell of a job.”

Unsurprisingly, Valentine still seems bitter about his and the team’s failures together in 2012. It’s unclear if David Ortiz was one of the “stupid people” he is referring to, but Big Papi did pin much of the blame for what happened last year on Bobby V. He also said his former manager has mental issues, so I doubt the two will be sending Christmas Cards to one another this December.

Bobby Valentine was a dead man walking the day the Boston Red Sox announced he would be their next manager last winter. Not only was he the wrong man for the job, but I highly doubt anyone would have been able to clean up Boston’s mess and lead a playoff charge. The Red Sox won only 69 games and finished in last in the AL East, and David Ortiz feels that Valentine was one of the main reasons why.

“A lot of players had a lot of issues with our manager last year,’’ Ortiz said according to ESPNBoston.com. “We have a new manager this year, a guy who is familiar with the organization, a guy we pretty much grew up around him. That’s John [Farrell].

“A team is like a human body. If the head is right, the body is going to function right, but if the head is messed up, then the body is going to be all over the place. It seems like that was part of our situation last year. Guys weren’t comfortable with the manager we had. Guys were struggling. Even in situations as a player you need to handle better, sometimes you get confused and get caught in a situation where you don’t know how you’re going to react with them.”

Ortiz was one of the few players who defended Valentine early on last year, but their relationship has since gone south thanks to Valentine’s claim that Ortiz had no interest in trying at the end of last season. Big Papi went on to say that he was concerned about Valentine’s approach during spring training last year, when the former manager had what Ortiz thought was an unorthodox style in leading drills and workouts.

Here’s what needs to happen in Boston: when players are asked about Bobby V., they need to tell reporters than he’s not there anymore and the team is moving forward. There should be no comparing Valentine and Farrell. Last year was one to forget in Boston. It’s time to turn the page.

Photo credit: Tom Szczerbowski-US PRESSWIRE

A little over a week ago, Bobby Valentine made his first public appearance since being fired as manager of the Boston Red Sox. As expected, he had plenty to say. Bobby V.’s comments about David Ortiz quitting on the team were easily the most noteworthy thing he said during his interview with Bob Costas. Ortiz responded to that accusation on Monday.

For starters, Big Papi said the decision for him to shut it down for the season after returning from the disabled list was one made by team doctors and had nothing to do with the megadeal between the Red Sox and Dodgers. Then, he had the following to say to ESPNDeportes.com about his former manager.

No. 3, after he went on national TV to say what he said, he sent me a text message trying to tell me that it was the media trying to change things. I did not respond to the message and I said to myself, this guy must have some mental issues or needs medicine or something? I said, I am dealing with someone crazy and I am not going to drive myself crazy, so it is better if I leave it alone.”

It’s easy to understand where Ortiz is coming from. The media didn’t try to twist anything. Valentine made the comments and there was only one way to interpret them. In addition to that, Ortiz was one of the few players who reportedly defended Bobby V. toward the beginning of the season when people were calling for his head. If Valentine made me look bad on national television for seemingly no reason, I wouldn’t want to hear what he had to say either.

Photo credit: Tom Szczerbowski-US PRESSWIRE

Former Boston Red Sox manager Bobby Valentine appeared on “Costas Tonight” with Bob Costas on Monday night in his first interview since the team fired him following the season. Since Boston parted ways with Valentine, we have been waiting see who he will blame for the abysmal season Red Sox fans just endured.

To his credit, Bobby V. blamed himself above all others and told Costas, “It was my fault.” However, he did take some time to throw David Ortiz under the bus. Valentine said Ortiz gave up on the season after Josh Beckett, Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford and Nick Punto were traded to the Dodgers.

“David Ortiz came back after spending about six weeks on the disabled list and we thought it was only going to be a week,” Valentine said. “He got two hits the first two times up, drove in a couple runs; we were off to the races. Then he realized that this trade meant that we’re not going to run this race and we’re not even going to finish the race properly and he decided not to play anymore. I think at that time it was all downhill from there.”

As Matthew Pouliot of Hardball Talk pointed out, the Red Sox were 60-66 when Ortiz returned from the disabled list. He certainly would have added pop to the lineup, but how many wins can a DH account for? The fact that he was hot in his first few plate appearances hardly means Boston was “off to the races.”

Ortiz did a great job of acting if he truly didn’t hurt himself while running out a double, but that’s beside the point. If Valentine is telling the truth and Ortiz gave up, that is obviously a bush league move and not something a leader would do. It does not, however, mean the end result would have been any different. Check out Bobby V.’s full interview below:

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ESPN was so prepared for the Red Sox to make an announcement on Thursday about the future of Bobby Valentine that they had Tim Kurkjian create two television reports: one in case Valentine were fired, and the other in case the Red Sox brought him back. Even though it was like 99.99999% certain Valentine would not be back, the network wanted to make sure they were prepared for either scenario.

Unfortunately, after the Red Sox announced Valentine would not be back, SportsCenter aired the report saying he would be returning. The result was a humorous conflicting message from ESPN; the scroll on the left side of the screen read “Bobby Valentine fired,” while Kurkjian was telling us in a prerecorded report that he’d be receiving a second chance.

“Valentine is getting a second chance because he never had his A-team on the field for even one minute this season,” the report said. “Major injuries to (Carl) Crawford, Jacoby Ellsbury, Andrew Bailey and others, had Valentine juggling new lineups everyday. He’s getting a second chance because the vaunted rotation once led by Josh Beckett and Jon Lester was terrible.”

ESPN quickly realized the error and pulled the report before it was done running. This sort of mistake is nothing new in broadcasting and print, but it sure produced a funny moment.

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