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Francona should have promised Rivera would close

Ken Davidoff

July 15, 2008

'He's going to be a Hall of Famer, and he's earned that spot, and he's the best. He's the best in the business, and you will see Mariano Rivera closing the game."

Sounds pretty painless, don't you think?

Those are the words of Ozzie Guillen, the American League manager, the day before the 2006 All-Star Game.

Terry Francona could have swiped that script, verbatim - no one would've complained - and added just one more sentence:

"What better way to close out this great tribute to Yankee Stadium than by having one of the game's best-ever closers, a homegrown Yankee, pitch the ninth inning?"

However, Francona, who usually plays all the right notes in settings like these, said nothing like that yesterday. Instead, he refused to commit to using Rivera as his closer in tonight's Midsummer Classic in the Bronx - even though Rivera will absolutely serve that role, no doubt about it.

Through his inaction, Francona unintentionally dissed the great Rivera, who very much deserves to be a focal point at this event.

"We're not going to announce our rotation yet," Francona said at a news conference at Manhattan's Grand Hyatt hotel. " ... Clint [Hurdle, the National League manager] doesn't need our help."

When I pointed out that Guillen had no trouble showing his cards two years earlier, Francona said, "Ozzie did a lot of things. Ozzie announced our starting pitcher. [In 2005, the last All-Star Game Francona managed, Guillen prematurely announced that White Sox lefthander Mark Buehrle would start the game].

"We'll wait. Out of the spirit of the game, competition, having a little bit of fun, we're not going to announce the rest of the rotation yet. Got to have something to write later."

He said this all with a smile, and Michael Kay, the news conference's moderator, turned to Hurdle and asked, "Do you expect it to be Mariano Rivera?" Hurdle responded, "I'm gonna stick my neck out there and say we'll prepare for him a little bit, watch a little video."

Yes, this was all in good fun, and I'm not accusing Francona of something horrible. Just a missed opportunity, is all.

We should have been going down the line of All-Star players, soliciting tributes to Rivera's greatness. Instead, the question turned into "who do you think should close for the AL?"

Rivera, not one to make waves, was honest yet undemanding. He said: "I definitely want to pitch in the ninth. But if it doesn't happen, I'm a baseball player ... You know your role. You know when you can pitch and when you can't pitch. Definitely, I'll be OK."

Jonathan Papelbon, Boston's dominant closer, insisted that the decision was "not just this easy."

"I think we've both earned that right," Papelbon continued. "Us by winning the World Series and having our manager there, and our team being represented. And ... Mariano, what he's done to this role, and in Yankee Stadium, and blah blah blah.

" ... See? It's not that easy, man. Everybody thinks it's just a cut-and-dried answer, when it's not."

But substitute "nine more years of experience than me" for the "blah blah blah," and you see why it is very much a cut-and-dried answer.

And after the player availability, the eccentric Papelbon went to The Boston Globe's Gordon Edes and said in part, "Mariano Rivera will be closing the 2008 All-Star Game in Yankee Stadium. I'm making a statement right now, saying I don't want it; I want him to have it. I said all that earlier, but that's the way I feel about it."

Jason Varitek, the usually stoic Red Sox catcher, made it clear that Rivera will close, and that it was the right call by Francona.

"His seniority, the venue and what he's accomplished in this game," Varitek said, expressing his admiration for Rivera.

If you point a finger at Francona and accuse him of possessing evil Rivalry motivations for the way he handled this, I'd say you're wrong. Francona always has expressed respect for Rivera, and Derek Jeter, and Alex Rodriguez.

No, this seemed more about the manager stubbornly wanting to do something on his clock. It cost Rivera a day of unfettered adulation from his peers.

We'll all survive. But this should have gone down differently.