After one year of seeing him as Sox GM, I have to say that Ben Cherington does not impress me.
His credentials seem positive. Like his three immediate predecessors, Cherington is a native New Englander-born in New Hampshire, graduating from Amherst College and picking up a Masters in Sports Management from UMass. He was originally hired by Dan Duquette at age 25 and worked in various organizational jobs until 2005. He was briefly co-GM during Theo Epstein’s short absence, and following Theo’s return moved back up the ladder to senior VP and assistant GM. He was appointed to his present position last October.
Cherington took over after the Sox’ embarrassing 2011 fold and chicken-and-beer controversy. Things went badly almost from the first. His first choice as manager, Dale Sveum, was vetoed by ownershiip. Some in his position would have quit on the spot, but Ben chose to stay and try to work with eventual choice Bobby Valentine. The results, as we know, were pretty much disastrous.
One thing Cherington seems to lack is an identity, which his predecessors all had. The late Lou Gorman, as was reflected in his nickname, established his as a kindly uncle who could be tough on occasion and was smarter than he looked. Duquette was an able, intelligent man who might have succeeded in Boston except for his total inability to relate to the media. Epstein, despite a number of poor free agent signings, did preside over two World Championships. His identity, which occasionally worked against him, was that of a rather tough kid from Brookline who wasn’t afraid to offend people.
At times during 2012 Cherington seemed almost out of the loop. As ownership gave Valentine rather hollow votes of confidence, he often remained silent. At the time of the trade which tried to rid the clubhouse of underachievers but left the team pretty much naked, Ben had little to say.
The Globe’s Nick Cafardo recently quoted Cherington’s assessment of the season: “We fell out of it earlier than we wanted to. You have to start looking forward…..Spent a lot of time with ownership in the last two weeks and the better part of September talking about that. I need to look at myself and the operation to see where we can improve…It’s not going to happen overnight and we have to get back into it.” I hear there nothing but platitudes.
Cherington looks younger than his 38 years. He sometimes appears overwhelmed by the team’s many problems. But as the Sox search for a new manager, ownership also has to be concerned about the abilities of their GM. Perhaps an assistant like Jason Varitek will help. Ben is right about one thing, however. It’s not going to happen overnight.
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