Red Sox excluded Don Orsillo’s tribute from Jerry Remy ceremony

The Red Sox made a shameful mistake by excluding Don Orsillo

The Boston Red Sox held a ceremony to honor the life of Jerry Remy prior to Wednesday’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays at Fenway Park. Family, former teammates and many former co-workers from his 33-year broadcast career with NESN were in attendance to pay their respects to Remy but their emotional tribute was overshadowed by one notable absence.

Don Orsillo, Remy’s broadcast partner for 15 seasons on NESN from 2001-15, was excluded from the chance to honor his friend and longtime colleague during the ceremony. Orsillo took to Twitter last night to explain that he was offered the opportunity to do a video message for the ceremony but he was later told by the Red Sox and NESN that his video would no longer be needed.

Orsillo shared a screenshot of the script he intended to use for the video, which beautifully expressed his feelings for a dear friend.

Why wouldn’t NESN and the Red Sox want this included?

According to Chad Finn of The Boston Globe, the Red Sox invited Orsillo to the ceremony but he was unable to attend in person due to his commitment to broadcasting games for the San Diego Padres. A recorded video had been discussed but the Red Sox claim they never promised Orsillo the opportunity and they ultimately decided that videos wouldn’t be part of the ceremony.

So, on one side we have Orsillo saying the team offered him the chance to contribute only for the offer to be rescinded while the Red Sox are denying that they ever agreed to anything, they merely had a discussion about the possibility. Oh, so their offer didn’t count because they never pinky promised?

It’s understandable why Orsillo couldn’t make it to Fenway when his current employer needed him to broadcast a game on the other side of the country. A video tribute would have been a welcome alternative.

NESN clearly had a tightly coordinated schedule for this ceremony and wanted to keep the focus on the field. They should have made an exception for Orsillo though. Don wanted to do it. Jerry would have wanted him to. Red Sox Nation wanted to hear from him. How hard could it have been to squeeze in a video that would have only lasted a minute or two? If it delays the game by a couple of minutes, so be it. It’s not as if Gerrit Cole was pitching.

Following a miserable last-place finish by the Red Sox in 2015, NESN decided to shake things up with a makeover that included the departure of Orsillo. Dave O’Brien has done a fine job as his replacement calling games but he lacks Orsillo’s charisma and personality. Don and Jerry had unrivaled chemistry in the booth. They made the games entertaining even when the game itself wasn’t always all that interesting.

Fans still haven’t forgiven the network, which is owned by the Red Sox and therefore means the team is held accountable, for breaking up the dynamic broadcast duo. While his exclusion might not have been meant as an intentional slight against him, Orsillo’s absence will feed the narrative that NESN mistreated the most popular partner that Remy ever worked with.

The Red Sox will counter by pointing out that Orsillo was featured in the tribute show that aired on NESN last month. They didn’t digitally wipe him from every clip in a sinister attempt to erase Orsillo from our memories. His partnership with Remy had been acknowledged by the network, so no hard feelings, right? Which makes it all the more baffling that they couldn’t carve out a sliver of time during the pregame ceremony to include Don, allowing him to honor his friend in his own words.

There’s no excuse for excluding Orsillo from a ceremony that he was eager to participate in and deserved to be a part of. If his omission wasn’t intentional, it’s an embarrassing oversight. For an organization that pretends to be mindful of public perception, the Red Sox continue to drop the ball.