The Red Sox have struggled mightily in Bobby Valentine's first season as manager, but owner John Henry isn't ready to pin all of the blame on the Boston skipper.
"When we look at what has happened this year, again, I know I've said it before, but I don't blame Bobby Valentine for this," Henry said Thursday during a radio appearance on WEEI's Mut & Merloni. "I think we have a lot of culpability ourselves at the highest levels of the Red Sox. One of the things we should have been looking at is how much injuries have played a part, if not in baseball, at least in baseball, how much injuries have played a part in this club since 2006. But we still continued to concentrate on high-ticket players rather than depth. That really hurt us this year."
The Red Sox have undoubtedly endured their fair share of injuries this season, and Valentine has been forced time and time again to shuffle his lineup and rotation. That has helped alleviate placing some of the blame on the manager, although Henry understands that injuries weren't the only issue that plagued the Sox this season.
"You can't use injuries as an excuse," Henry said. "Therefore, I would say we weren't as prepared, hadn't realized and hadn't caught on quickly enough, I think, how important it is to have what Earl Weaver used to talk about and Larry [Lucchino] has talked about this year that's called deep depth. He used to talk about deep depth. That's something that we're focusing on much more going forward."
The Red Sox have much more flexibility when it comes to constructing that depth going forward, which is something Henry also noted during Thursday's interview.
Click here to read John Henry's comments about not selling the Red Sox >>
