I figure people in Boston followed this more closely than the rest of us, but this passage from Sean McAdam’s story about the Red Sox firing Bob McClure says an awful lot:
McClure was granted a leave of absence from the team earlier in the season to attend to a sick infant who was seriously ill and Niemann served as interim pitching coach in McClure’s absence. After McClure returned, Valentine later made mention of McClure’s “two-week vacation” before correcting himself.
Gordon Edes, talking about the same verbal slip, firmly believes that it was no accident on Valentine’s part.
The Red Sox’ pitching stinks, so it probably made no difference, but when you are so far from being on the same page as your manager that he’s jabbing you over a leave of absence to attend to your sick child, you really never had any job security at all.
