ESPN.com - What comes around for Kerrigan

ESPN.com: Page 2

Tuesday, March 5, 2002
Updated: March 6, 12:32 PM ET
What comes around for Kerrigan

By Bob Halloran
Special to Page 2

Friends, baseball fans, countryman, lend me your ears -- or in this case, your eyes -- as I explain to you that Joe Kerrigan is an unqualified-to-manage, half-truth-spewing, baseball-cap-wearing, clipboard-carrying, modern-day version of Brutus.


	Beware the Ides of March, Joe Kerrigan.

Well & et tu, Joe Kerrigan. It's your turn to beware the Ides of March. Wouldn't it have been the height of irony if the new owners of the Red Sox had waited to bump off Kerrigan until March 15, the same day Julius Caesar was slain by his so-called friend, Brutus? That would have been my only request to the new Red Sox ownership, who sadly, are not Shakespeare buffs. Wait till the 15th, I would have begged them. Make it perfect. Do it for me, and for literacy in America.

In "The Tragedy of Julius Caesar," by William Shakespeare, Brutus helps to kill Caesar -- despite claiming to love him (as a friend). At Caesar's burial, Brutus addresses the crowd:

As Caesar loved me, I weep for him;
as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it;
as he was valiant, I honor him:
but, as he was ambitious, I slew him.

Loosely translated that means: Sure, I killed the guy, but I'm pretty conflicted about it.

At the press conference on the day Jimy Williams was fired, Joe Kerrigan addressed the crowd of reporters and said: "I still consider (Williams) a friend, and I still hope to consider him a friend in future years."

A friend like that will watch your back -- so he can stab you in it! (Which is actually a bit kinder and gentler than Brutus, who stabbed Caesar in the groin. The "et tu" line was apparently delivered as a falsetto.)

		There was nothing noble about Joe Kerrigan the day he became manager of the Red Sox. He wept not for fired Jimy Williams! Instead, he delivered several clues regarding his betrayal. First, he said he was completely taken by surprise when Dan Duquette called him up to his office and offered him the manager's job. So surprised, in fact, that he walked out of that short meeting with a two-year contract.

My biggest problem with the play "Julius Caesar" is how Brutus is portrayed in the end. I was fine with the parts where he's haunted by "great Caesar's ghost," goes a little crazy, his wife kills herself, and then he kills himself, too. Shakespeare liked a lot of death! And it was all right with me that the good-for-nothing Brutus-Judas fell on his own sword. But since everyone believed Brutus truly was a friend of Caesar's and only killed him because he was afraid Caesar would become a tyrant and destroy the Roman Empire (a little dramatic if you ask me), the play ends with Brutus coming off as some kind of a hero. Marc Antony announces over Brutus' body: "This was the noblest Roman of them all."

Well, there was nothing noble about Joe Kerrigan the day he became manager of the Red Sox. He wept not for Jimy Williams! Instead, he delivered several clues regarding his betrayal. First, he said he was completely taken by surprise when Dan Duquette called him up to his office and offered him the manager's job. So surprised, in fact, that he walked out of that short meeting with a two-year contract.

I am absolutely convinced Kerrigan lobbied for that job every chance he got. "Hey, Dan, you wanna know what the players are saying about Jimy now? I'm telling you they don't respect him. You might want to do something about this."

Back to the play for more insight, and contrived segues. Cassius, who co-conspired with Brutus, said:

Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves &

Kerrigan certainly mastered his own fate that day, and revealed many faults as well. Just count the lies, half-truths and incessant politicking when he first took over. Kerrigan said he would use a set lineup, run more and determine, once and for all, if Derek Lowe or Ugueth Urbina was his closer. Why did he say these things? Because that's what everyone wanted to hear. Those were the criticisms of his predecessor. Brutus was playing to the crowd, and the crowd bought into it.

And what did he ultimately do? He used 14 different lineups in his first 14 games. The Red Sox weren't any more aggressive on the bases, and he flip-flopped on the closer controversy right out of the gate -- inspiring an expletive-laden diatribe from Lowe. Makes me think when Jimy wasn't getting an public support by Duquette, that Kerrigan put his arm around Jimy and told him not to worry about it, and then he'd run to Duquette with his lips puckered.


	Astros manager Jimy Williams, at right with Yankees coach Don Zimmer, better keep watching his back.

This spring, Kerrigan claimed he doesn't even think about the possibility of losing his job. Lies like that one infuriate me, because they're so ridiculous I have to assume the person saying it just can't help himself. He gains nothing from the lie. Nobody believes it anyway. Therefore, he must be doing it just for sport.

I wonder if the players are suspicious of Kerrigan's tactics and integrity. They certainly didn't gravitate toward him. Lowe went off on him in the media. Everett berated him in front of the team during a practice last September. By the end of the season, Everett, Manny Ramirez and Pedro Martinez all left the team early. They quit on their manager, which says something about them, but maybe it also says something about their manager. Namely, that they don't respect him. Why? I gaurantee you it's not simply because the team lost 26 of its first 38 games under Kerrigan (though that couldn't have helped).

The act before Brutus and his co-conspirators stabbed Caesar more than 20 times, Caesar said:

Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once.

Somehow, I think Joe Kerrigan's going to die more times than just Tuesday, when he finally got what he deserved -- the boot. And me? Like fans of the Bard watching "Julius Caesar," I'll applaud every time it happens.

Bob Halloran is an anchorman for ESPNEWS.