Abraham With Toucher & Rich: It Had To Be Bobby

After two months the Boston Red Sox have finally made a decision when it comes to their new manager.

The job goes to Bobby Valentine, who will likely be introduced by the team within the next day or two.

Peter Abraham started out covering the Mets when Bobby Valentine was on their bench. 98.5 The Sports Hub's Toucher & Rich spoke with Abraham about Valentine as a manager, and if he be a good fit for the Sox.

"He was a handful. It was almost like you were covering the Bobby Valentine Mets not just the Mets because Bobby was part of the story pretty much every day," Abraham said.

Will this be good for Boston?

"Well I think it's good for the Red Sox if what he's doing is positive and what he's doing makes sense in the clubhouse, and that was the way with the Mets for a long time. He took some pretty mediocre teams and helped them into the playoffs; they were in the 2000 World Series with guys like Benny Agbayani playing every night and when it went sour it got pretty ugly. So it's either really good with Bobby or really bad," Abraham said.

When Valentine was manager of the Mets there were stories of clubhouse antics and drug use. Will Valentine be able to control a team that has already been having problems in the clubhouse?

"With every Major League team there's nonsense in the clubhouse, you just don't hear about it all the time. It's not like there's 29 other teams and they're all sitting there in the dugout cheering in unison and then there's one pack of morons who are drinking beer. It's like that everywhere you just don't hear about it all the time," said Abraham.

There was a lot of talk that Valentine has not hesitated to call out his players in the past. Are the egos on this Sox team so fragile that his actions could do more harm than good?

"I was thinking about that then I looked at the 40 man roster and there's only 10 guys on this team who have spent more than two years with Terry Francona. So it's not like the entire clubhouse is beholden to Terry Francona and will have no idea how to handle another manager. Most of these guys have played for a bunch of different managers who have different personalities, guys who are much better much worse whatever it may be," Abraham said.

Of the five or six guys that the Sox talked to besides Valentine is there anybody else that would have been just as good for this clubhouse and this management team?

"Well if you ask the baseball operations guys I'm sure the thought Dale Sveum was and they couldn't get him past ownership. So at that point I think it had to be Bobby because there was nobody else on that list that I think you could justify firing Terry Francona to hire this guy as manager," said Abraham.

Listen to the full interview to find out if Abraham thinks that Ben Cherington and the Red Sox will be able to handle things in free agency quicker than they did with this manager search...