Jon Lester left baseball on his own terms Wednesday, telling ESPN that “I don’t want someone else telling me I can’t do this anymore. I want to be able to hand my jersey over and say, ‘Thank you, it’s been fun.’ “
It wasn’t entirely unexpected. He’d spoken to the Globe on Tuesday, presumably to check his temperature about a 17th MLB season, and offered basically the same quote with the caveat that “there’s also the desire to still want to do it.”
One last time, though, Lester got it right on the biggest stage.