That's right. The 2012 team was still in the chase for a wild card at the end of July. And it's not like Valentine was the main reason for the awful season. But he was certainly bad enough to blow his one and last chance to be an MLB manager.
Nava was definitely one of my favorite players the first half of last year at least. He was an on-base machine for a pretty long stretch. He had a lot to do with our first half success.
I get that, but I don't understand your statement that 'they saved a grand total of 4 million.' I would guess Boras was originally asking for 35-45 million.
This is a horror show alright. There's nothing you can say, really. All you can do is hope it gets better somehow. Just win a couple of games and get that feeling back.
In most cases, championship teams are unsustainable aberrations.
Granted the 2014 Sox are taking more of a nosedive than most championship teams.
But hardly anybody repeats anymore - nobody's done it since the 2000 Yanks.