Since the Red Sox acquired Victor Martinez at the deadline that summer, the entire dynamic of the Red Sox changed quite a bit. Not only was Martinez partly pushing aside captain Jason Varitek in the lineup, but he was trying to build relationships with an entirely new staff.
Since then, much has been made about certain pitchers working well or poorly with either Martinez or Varitek. To those of us that don’t pitch in the major leagues, figuring out the subtle differences between the two wasn’t easy to the untrained eye. Yet Jon Lester, while on 98.5 The Sports Hub’s Toucher and Rich Show, helped explain the differences.
In short, the difference can be summed up as a matter of one following his head and the other following his instinct.
“‘Tek’s more of a knowledge guy,” Lester said on the radio show. “He’s been back there a long time and he knows a lot of these guys very, very well. He studies them, he reads the charts that we get … what their swing percentages in certain counts [are]. All that stuff that’s important. He knows that going into a game, and so he calls the game a lot on that.
“Vic’s more of a feel guy,” Lester explained. “If he’s got a feeling that a fastball away right here’s got this guy, he’s gonna want to call that.”
Lester also downplayed the possibility that Daisuke Matsuzaka may request to only throw to Varitek, following his no-hit bid on Saturday night in Philadelphia.
“I think a lot of times people read too much into personal catchers,” he said. “I don’t think it’s going to be a big deal.”
For his part, Lester said he doesn’t prefer one over the other.
“I like both of them,” said Lester, who owns a 2.48 ERA when throwing to Martinez and a 3.65 ERA when throwing to Varitek. “I like to know that we’ve got a lot of knowledge back there [with Varitek] and I like to kind of go with the flow of the game with Vic.”
