I believe that baseball mirrors life more than any other team sport.
You can adopt a natural pace of growth.
You can plan on short-term gains for short-term success.
In Thursday’s St. Louis Post Dispatch (9/12/2019), Jeff Gordon blames Dave Dombrowski for the fall of the Red Sox in 2019 following their World Series Championship season. In truth, the Red Sox succumbed to the short-term success plan since the early days of John Henry, their owner. While their outfield is a paragon of player development, their pitching staff is the wreckage of free agency and expensive trades. The Red Sox have not developed a starting pitcher since John Lester, who was allowed to roam in 2014. Dave Dombrowski merely perpetuated a neglect of pitcher development in the Red Sox Farm system.
Gordon makes a fair comparison between the management of the Cardinals and the Red Sox to show how player development matters. As I observed in my blog of September 7,
On the list of teams with the top 218 pitching prospects in 2017 the Cardinals ranked fourth in the Majors. Two of those pitchers head up their starting rotation in 2019– Jack Flaherty and Dakota Hudson. Their top prospect, Alex Reyes, has a live, but vulnerable arm. He could still make a difference. [https://www.vivaelbirdos.com/2017/5/13/15626852/cardinals-top-pitching-prospects-lance-lynn].
The Red Sox are 27th on this list of pitching prospects, ahead of the Orioles and the Tigers. The results speak for themselves–only Brandon Workman has a promising future. Bobby Poyner and Darwinzon Hernandez may prove to be diamonds in the rough, but they are not making anyone forget Craig Kimbrel. No success stories, present or future. [https://wtucker.edublogs.org/2019/09/07/prospects-on-parade/]
I believe success requires planning, collaboration, execution, some luck.
The development of pitchers takes time and excellent coaching. Clearly the Cardinals took the time to develop most of their rotation and bullpen. Their patience is paying off this year. They will likely be in the playoffs, and with their excellent staff, they could go deep. Their hitting remains the issue, but they did move on the free agent market to get Paul Goldschmidt this year. They have systematically built a competitive team.
The Red Sox have developed a remarkable outfield and up-the-middle players, but the salaries of their pitching staff could prevent them from keeping Mookie Betts, whose contract is up in 2020. Meanwhile their entire staff is plagued with arm problems, except for Rick Porcello, who is merely a plague. If they had some young pitchers to replace the few, the gold-plated, the ailing, they could look forward to better times. Bobby Poyner and Darwinzon Hernandez will not fill that bill.
Thus the Red Sox have no recourse but to spend their time and money on young prospects and wait patiently for them to develop. Gordon predicts in today’s article:
. . . Henry is ready for some Cardinals-like stability. Insiders note that the Red Sox are likely to hire a younger person to oversee the baseball operation.
Long before Dave Dombrowksy the Red Sox adopted the short-term growth for short-term gain approach to baseball. The bill is now due for that policy.
I believe if you plan and play well, there is no failure without redemption.