BOSTON -- These are the games that whiten a manager's hair while reddening his critics' cheeks. It was a minor miracle, then, after the eighth inning Wednesday that Farrell didn't resemble actor Steve Martin underneath his Boston Red Sox cap and Fenway Park's bleachers weren't packed with tomatoes.
But it also proved, once again, how seldom one in-game decision -- or even a series of them -- made by a manager actually influences the outcome.
In case you missed it, Farrell declined to use closer Craig Kimbrel for a four-out save. Instead, he left Fernando Abad and combustible Junichi Tazawa to blow a two-run lead in the top of the eighth, the latest in a line of recent misadventures by Red Sox relievers not named Kimbrel.