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Red Sox Rule: Terry Francona and Boston's Rise to Dominance | 
 enlarge | Author: Michael Holley
Publisher: HarperEntertainment
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
Buy New: $14.61
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Avg. Customer Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 2101
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6.3 x 1
ISBN: 0061458546
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.357640974461
EAN: 9780061458545
ASIN: 0061458546
Publication Date: April 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new book. Over 3.5 million customers served. Order now. Selling books online since 1995. Order with confidence. Code: B20080511230353T
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Product Description
Michael Holley, bestselling author of Patriot Reign, provides an inside look at how it all happened. With the exclusive cooperation of Terry Francona and stories from the clubhouse and the conference room, Holley reveals the private sessions and the dugout and front-office strategies that have made the Boston Red Sox a budding dynasty. When Grady Little's job prospects were dimming during game seven of the Red Sox-Yankees playoffs in 2003, Oakland A's bench coach Terry Francona was puttering around his house, unaware of his fate. General manager Theo Epstein and owner John Henry sat in their Fenway box, praying that Little would pull Pedro Martinez. And fans throughout New England howled when Martinez remained in the game and the Sox lost the series. They wanted Little's head, and they got it. In Epstein and Henry's search for a manager, they wanted someone from the new school, someone who could manage wealthy and/or sensitive players and rely not only on gut and instinct but also on the cold science of statistics. Francona, the son of a professional baseball player and a major leaguer himself until devastating knee injuries ended his career prematurely, was a dark horse candidate. After all, he'd been a mediocre manager while with the Phillies. But he had a great head for the game, and as the manager for the minor league Birmingham Barons, he had managed none other than Michael Jordan without a glitch. After Francona's job interview with Epstein, which included a written test and a game simulation, the Red Sox felt they'd found their man. And now, after two championships in four seasons, they have their proof. With a team of disparate personalities, from the inscrutable Manny Ramirez to the affable David Ortiz, Francona and the Red Sox have overtaken their hated archnemesis, the New York Yankees, as the American League's elite team. Insightful, fascinating, and surprising, Red Sox Rule is the story of the changing face of baseball and the inner workings of its finest organization.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Red Sox Rule April 25, 2008
Red Sox Rule: Terry Francona and Boston's Rise to Dominance
Red Sox Rule is a well written, entertaining book about the Boston Red Sox and their rising gain of respect in baseball, culminating in two World Series victories in four years. In the forefront is the Manager, Terry Francona, and the book tells the Red Sox story through Francona's life story.
This is a baseball book that will appeal to more than baseball fans, as it is a very appealing story of a family whose business happens to be baseball.
Michael Holley is a skilled story teller, and knows how to tell a lot in succinct style. His chapter on Birdie Francona's battle with cancer will ring true for anyone who has had the illness strike his family.
For parents of children who love baseball, the book's positive storyis worthwhile, and with a minimum of strong language.
 Interesting but muddled view of the 2007 Red Sox April 16, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
In this book, Michael Holley writes a book that seems unclear as to what it is trying to do. Is it trying to profile the new dynasty of the Red Sox as the title suggests or is it trying to show what type of management style works best in baseball as the work suggest or is it trying to do something else? I find this book to oftentimes be muddled and confusing as to what it is trying to do exactly. I agree with a lot of the other criticism that the book lacks focus and also seems to lack a frame other then when it suites the immediate need of the story
I also find interesting that Holley managed to write this book without hardly a mention of Curt Schilling. Schilling is in there when discussing Terry Francona in Philadelphia and of course when he pitches in the playoffs, but other than that there is hardly a mention of him.
All in all I think Red Sox fans will enjoy this book but in my mind it provides very little insight into the team.
How to lead and win in the new century April 13, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is less about the team than the manager who is so low key, Sox fans may underrate his accomplishments.
To place my review in context, I began following the Sox in the early sixties and suffered through the terrible (Higgins, Herman), the incomprehensible (Kasko, J. Williams), the lost (Hobson, McNamara), the temporary (Kerrigan, Popowski) and the flawed but effective (D. Williams, Houk, Johnson, Kennedy). We fans waited for the leader to bring us to the promised land and found him in the unassuming guise of Tito. This guy not only led the not quite believable comeback against the Yankees in 2004 but is 8-0 in the World Series with a team which recently lost 13 straight post-season games.
The book describes Tito as the son of a major leaguer, one of the best college players in the country, manager of Michael Jordan in Birmingham and failed player due to injuries. He had the strength to fight through the lost dream of being a productive major leaguer and the cauldron of managing in the meanest sports city in the US (Philly)to become part of the troika who saved the Red Sox. Of the 3 (Owner, GM and manager), somehow Tito has gotten the least attention.
Red Sox Rule can also be read as a business book with insights into the changing requirements of management success in a changing business. It explores the transition from directive leadership (Dick Williams) to servant leadership (Francona) and how the latter fits the times.
I appreciate the game and Francona more after reading this book. Sox fans should remember that the press ripped Ted Williams when he played and fans bood Yaz early in his career. We probably should understand and respect the best manager the Sox have had in our lifetime while he is here even if his personality and management style is not nearly as self promoting as Bill Parcells or as in-the-face as Bill Belicek.
I was in a Red Sox bar in Denver prior to Game 3 of the 2007 World Series and one Sox fan was reaching the panic point concerning the decision to have Ortiz play first base. I quietly said to the stranger, "Tito always makes the right decisions in post-season." He replied, "That's right," smiled and instantly calmed down. It is a new era for Sox fans.
After a close loss in which you want to debate a manager decision, remember: 86 years, end of Curse, 4 straight vs. NY, 8 consecutive World Series wins and, most of all, 2 championships.
Along with Big Popi and the Schill, Tito gets a lifetime pass from this fan.
RICK "SHAQ" GOLDSTEIN SAYS: "TERRY FRANCONA: SOMETIMES NICE GUYS DO FINISH FIRST!" March 27, 2008
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
When Terry Francona was hired to manage the Boston Red Sox in 2004 he was following in the footsteps of THIRTY-TWO different men who had tried unsuccessfully to win one World Championship in the past EIGHTY-FIVE-YEARS! The Red Sox play their home games on the hallowed ground of Fenway Park. Despite being baseball's smallest and oldest park, it has the sport's longest string of consecutive sellouts: as of the writing of this book the total was 388 straight games, nearly 5 seasons. To "old-school" baseball purists like me Fenway is a "FIELD OF DREAMS". I am not from Boston, but one of my goals that has always been on my "wish" list of sports experiences I wanted to accomplish, was to go to Fenway and have a beer in front of the famed "GREEN-MONSTER", and on July 18, 2007 I lived my Fenway dream. (I even posted the picture of my visit as my Amazon profile picture.) Along with the celebrated ballpark, the Red Sox fans in New England are renowned for their fervor and sports knowledge. There have been a number of "life-changing" events in Red Sox history that have been agonizingly passed down from Grandparents to Parents to sons and daughters, and I'm sure even whispered to the womb along with soothing music, that ranged from selling Babe Ruth to the hated Yankees, the 1978 collapse, Bucky *@#! Dent, and the latest one that led to Terry Francona's hiring: Grady Little leaving Pedro Martinez in the seventh game of the 2003 Red Sox-Yankees playoff game. This is the backdrop that the book is built around.
The author describes the interview process between Red Sox executives and Terry that included a quiz along with game simulation and decision making. The reader is also taken back to Terry's childhood in Western Pennsylvania. He had loving parents and his Father Tito was a big league player whose high-water mark was a 363 average in 1959. From the time Terry was a child he had one goal: he was going to be a Major League baseball player. He was a star in high school and turned down a bonus contract from the Cubs and went to the University of Arizona. From there Francona played for multiple big league clubs with a career marred and shortened by injuries and retired with a 274 lifetime average. After numerous scouting jobs he wound up as the manager of the Birmingham Barons, the Chicago White Sox Double-A farm team. As fate may have it, Terry's path in the minors converged with the all-time great basketball player Michael Jordan. Jordan had retired from basketball and was following a childhood dream of attempting to be a big league baseball player. The unique dilemma of having to manage/handle the biggest star in the world, while integrating the needs of young baseball hopefuls in the midst of a national media circus would pay large dividends down the road for Francona and probably was just as important on his resume as managing the Phillies.
Major League baseball had become a haven for egotistical, pampered, mal-adjusted, multi-millionaire ballplayers, and it would take a unique centered individual to be able to manage a team full of such players, especially in sports crazed Boston, where one bad game or bad decision by a manager or ballplayer, would throw that individual into a cauldron of verbal abuse on talk radio, the newspapers, TV and at the ballpark. After great scrutiny, the Red Sox brain trust decided that Terry Francona had the tools necessary to manage the Manny Ramirez's of today's game. The author brings you inside the emotional and severe physical hardships that Terry faced, but surprisingly the 2004 world championship is absent from this book. I had to keep checking the inside cover and flipping back through the pages to make sure I hadn't missed something. There also could have been much more detail regarding the Red Sox's most recent championship in 2007. If you acknowledge those two shortcomings, the rest of the book is a wonderful way to get to know what a genuinely nice guy and dedicated baseball man Terry Francona actually is.
Felt rushed March 25, 2008
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
There are very few books about the recent history of the Red Sox that I consider must-haves. This book, unfortunately, is not one of them. It took me an hour to barrel through: I am normally a really fast reader, but this book just didn't have much substance. The best parts were the autobiographical sections about Terry Francona as a child and early in his baseball career, periods I really didn't know much about. His pulmonary embolism episode was also a gripping read, and I found the description of his managerial interview with the Sox really fascinating. The rest of the book felt really rushed. As a previous reviewer noted, there was very little on the actual process of managing a game, and the glossing over of the 2004 playoffs and several other memorable episodes, such as Theo Epstein's resignation, was troubling. I also wanted a lot more on the 2007 playoffs instead of some quick summaries at the end. It made me think that Holley just didn't want to take the time to write all of it thoroughly so he could get it out before the 2008 season. Well, he was successful at that, but the price is unsophisticated, incomplete writing that will frustrate many fans and bore others.
Buy this book for the sections on Terry Francona's life, which are indeed very good, and don't expect 200 pages of meat. It's a solid book and an easy read, but hard core fans probably won't be satisfied and I didn't feel I got my money's worth.
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