Red Sox: Which Boston player’s career would you choose?

What defines a great career? Championships? Individual accomplishments? If you could mirror the career of a member of the Boston Red Sox, who would it be?

What matters most to you when evaluating a player’s career? Are you a ring chaser who only cares how many championships a player won? Flags do fly forever and titles are the reason these players play the game. We all know that the Boston Red Sox have been stockpiling championships as late.

Do you prefer to look at a player’s individual accomplishments instead since one man can’t win it all on his own? We know the five tools that make for a great ballplayer, but what accomplishments and accolades make for a great career?

The CBS Sports twitter account proposed this question late last night and it left me up all night pondering what I’d want my fictional sports legacy to be:

The four careers in this choose your own adventure game are:

Option A – 15x All-Star, 3x MVP, 5 Playoff Appearances, 0 Championship Titles
Option B – 0x All-Star, 0x MVP, 12 Playoff Appearances, 5 Championship Titles
Option C – 5x All-Star, 0x MVP, 9 Playoff Appearances, 2 Championship Titles
Option D – 3x All-Star, 1x MVP, 3 Playoff Appearances, 1 Championship Titles

To add some perspective to this exercise, I came up with some Red Sox players whose careers more or less match the above descriptions. To qualify for these comparisons the player had to spend more time on the Red Sox than any other team.

If I considered anyone who ever donned a Sox uniform then someone like Eric Gagne would qualify (Option D) and nobody wants that. Remember how terrible he was? We got Gagne a ring and what did he give us in return? A 6.75 regular-season ERA (14 ER in his 14 IP) and a blown save in the ALCS. Not a great deal.

Because I’m a man of honor and don’t want to let in just any riff-raff, I had to stretch a little to find a comp for some of the options. For example, no player who played for the Red Sox longer than any other ball club has won 3 MVP awards or 5 World Series titles. But that’s just the way it is and we’re all going to have to deal with it.

Option A –  15x All-Star, 3x MVP, 5 Playoff Appearances, 0 Championship Titles

Player Comparison: Ted Williams

Option A describes a generational talent, who at the end of an illustrious career has some hardware to show for it, but no trophies.

The only player that fits the mold here is Ted Williams. Teddy Ballgame was one of the greatest hitters the game has ever seen. He batted .344 lifetime and hit 521 home runs.

Williams wasn’t a stat-padder either, he was a competitor through and through. Going into the final weekend of the 1941 season Williams was hitting .401. His team encouraged him to sit out the last three games to keep his average above .400.

After all, the Red Sox were 17.5 games out of first place and any hopes of catching the Yankees in the pennant race were long dead. Williams refused and went 7-12 in those final games finishing the season at .406, the last player to hit above .400 for a season.

Boo-hoo he never won a World Series. Well, you know what he did win? A World War. Where’s that in your stat sheet?

Option B – 0x All-Star, 0x MVP, 12 Playoff Appearances, 5 Championship Titles

Player Comparison: Mike Timlin

This one is for people who have “There’s no I in team” tattooed on their bicep. Every team needs role players to fill in around their superstars. This player isn’t at the top of their field, but they get to lift the trophy and sip the champagne along with their teammates.

When Mike Timlin signed with Boston prior to the 2003 season, he was already a grizzled vet. He’d already earned two rings at the start of his career a member of the early 90’s Blue Jays squads that went back-to-back in 92-93.

It turned out he had quite a bit left in the tank and went on to pitch 6 seasons in Boston and was a part of both the ’04 and ’07 championship teams. Timlin never got voted to an All-Star game and certainly wasn’t a Cy Young candidate, but he does have 4 World Series rings to flash around whenever he likes.

(And if anyone is fact-checking my own made-up rules to this game, Timlin did spend more years with the Blue Jays, but pitched more innings for the Red Sox…so ha! Loophole city. Egg on your face.)

Option C – 5x All-Star, 0x MVP, 9 Playoff Appearances, 2 Championship Titles

Player Comparison: Jason Varitek

Option C illustrates someone who was a good player on an excellent team over a long period of time but never made the jump to MVP status.

There were a couple of decent options to fit this description: Kevin Youkilis, Jon Lester, Josh Beckett, but I had to go with the captain on this one. Jason Varitek spent the most time with the Red Sox and unlike Lester and Beckett, earned all his accolades in Boston.

Varitek was never the best player on the team, overshadowed by the likes of Nomar Garciaparra, Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, and Dustin Pedroia during his 15 seasons with the Red Sox, but he was a fan favorite and an integral part of both the ’04 and ’07 championship teams.

He was a solid player in his own right, making 3 trips to the All-Star game. He also holds the distinction of having caught the most no-hitters, with 4 (Hideo Nomo, Derek Lowe, Clay Buchholz, Jon Lester).