Excuse me? by Jared Carrabis
Adrian Gonzalez wasn't complaining about the schedule when he complained about the schedule


In a city that has seen such athletes such as Ted Williams, Larry Bird and Tom Brady, fans have grown accustomed to seeing the stars on their professional sports teams live an excuse-free life.

All my life playing baseball, excuses were like nails on a chalkboard to any one of my coaches. They just didn't want to hear it. "Don't give me an excuse; just own up to it and do it right the next time," they'd tell me. As a fan, I've adopted this mentality, as has much of Red Sox Nation. Excuses are usually more irritating than the action that you're trying to excuse yourself from taking responsibility for.

The morning after the Red Sox completed their historic collapse in Baltimore, the Boston Globe relayed these quotes from Adrian Gonzalez which were given to the media just before the second-to-last game of the season, which means the Red Sox weren't even out of a postseason spot at that point.

"We play too many night games on getaway days and get into places at 4 in the morning," Gonzalez told the Globe. "This has been my toughest season physically because of that. We play a lot of night games on Sunday for television and that those things take a lot out of you."

The reporter who penned the story wrote, "I told Gonzalez that teams like the Red Sox and Yankees have long had those challenges, it's part of playing for a high-profile team."

"Why does it have to be?" Gonzalez responded. "They can put the Padres on ESPN, too. The schedule really hurt us. Nobody is really reporting that."

I don't know about you, but that sounds like complaining to me. On Thursday, Gonzalez appeared on a radio station in San Diego, and denied that he complained about the schedule.

"I never brought up anything on my own and said anything out of a way to complain or say that it was the reason we lost or anything like that," Gonzalez told radio host Darren Smith. "I answered a question that was presented to me. I know I am taking a little bit of heat for the scheduling part, but that wasn’t something I did on my own. The writer came up to me and said 'Has the schedule been tough on you this year?' I said we played a lot of getaway night games. I said it has been the most grueling season physically for me. That was my answer to the question and the question was prior to the collapse, so I answered the question I was asked.

"It was written after the last game when we didn’t make the playoffs and it was mentioned in a way as I was complaining of the schedule. I wasn't. I was just answering the question of how hard it was on me. It was tough and it was really hard on my body....I've learned that you don't try to go out and try to justify your comments. You just let them be because you are never going to win the battle of trying to justify yourself."

Whether or not Gonzalez openly complained about the schedule on his own, or if he was asked a question and then proceeded to complain about the schedule really isn't relevant. The fact is that he did complain, and it fell on deaf ears, as Red Sox fans didn't want to hear any lame excuses.

We've heard guys take this route before, and there's no shame in doing it. When a reporter tries to lure you into making an excuse so that they can make a headline out of it, all you have to say is, "There's no excuse." I'm fine with that.

Carl Crawford owned up to his failures just fine at the end of the season, saying, "I know what kind of season I had. I know what I did. I have to go back home and live with that. It's going to be a tough offseason for me. I have to come back and prove myself."

Boom. That's how you handle the media. When they're all salivating at the opportunity to bury you in a headline, own up to it. That's all the fans want to hear. Crawford dealt with the same schedule that everyone else on that 25-man roster did, and he put the blame on himself, nowhere else. He said he's going to use his poor season as motivation to work harder towards 2012, simply turning a negative into a positive. That's how it's done.

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Published on October 13, 2011

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