Oh Captain, my Captain

O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:

But O heart! heart! heart!

O the bleeding drops of red,

Where on the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;

Here Captain! dear father!

This arm beneath your head;

It is some dream that on the deck,

You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;

Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!

But I, with mournful tread,

Walk the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

There's a general consensus in the baseball world, especially among executives - catchers are not able to sustain their performance very long into their 30s. Anyone who's ever caught behind the plate at any level of baseball surely realises it's pretty hard work. Now image doing that 5 days per week for 3-4 hours a pop for at least 6 months per year!

Pudge Rodriguez (aided by Scott Boras) signed a 4 year $40m deal with the then hapless Tigers at the age of 33. Pudge is, and rightly so, considered as one of the best "two-tool" catchers of all time. Apart from a sensational defensive catcher (48% of all basestealers gunned down in his career, by far the best ever), he was also a very potent batter. Not very surprisingly Rodriguez average and slugging percentage peak of .332/.588 came at the age of 28 in 1999 (Excluding his injury shortened .347/.667 2000 season when he only played 91 games). Clearly, there are more than just stats in play when it comes to the catcher position, such as leadership and the ability to handle and guide the pitching staff, something Pudge did well for most of his time with the Tigers (although there were a few grumblings in Detroit) . However, in his 5 years there, he never bettered his first season of .334/.510 with 19 HRs (admittedly, a superb year for anyone, much more so for a catcher), and anyone who saw his sorry shadow of a former self in his .219/.323 in 33 games with the Yankees must be joining me in thinking - "Pudge, you've got countless of millions in the bank, pack it up now..."

After the 2004 season, at the age of 32 the Red Sox went against their own policy and offered Jason Varitek (and Scott Boras) a similar $40m, 4 year contract (albeit without the flood of injury protection the Tigers managed to put in theirs). Uptil then, the Red Sox would not go past 3 years for any player older than 30. (See Martinez, Pedro and Schilling, Curt.) V-Tek, considered without equals in regards to handling a pitching staff, was never a batter of Rodriguez standards, but coming off a .297/.482 season with a career best average (He was a .271 life time batter after the 2004 season), the Red Sox decided he was a risk worth taking.

As my math skills are not at Bill James' level, I am unable to look at how much Varitek's handling of the Red Sox pitchers have aided the teams success, but I think it's safe to say that he has been a huge factor in that respect, especially considering he's been behind the plate for 4 no-no's in his career. However, as many Sox fans, I have with pain watched his steady decline in the batters box. From .281 in 2005 to .220 in 2008, Varitek is now just marginally more dangerous at the plate than an NL pitcher. A sad indicator is the increasingly frequent number of times Francona has lifted Varitek for a pinch hitter late in games, most recently in game 5 of the ALCS when pinch hitter Sean Davis sadly struck out.

If the Rays, and they're still clearly odds on favourites, knock out the Red Sox in either game 6 or 7, game 5 might have been the last time for Varitek in a Red Sox uniform at Fenway. Question is if Varitek, a Boras client, would be willing to take a more limited role in a short deal with the Red Sox for 2009, or if he would seek a longer contract elsewhere.

I am personally torn.

As with Pedro leaving in 2004, Varitek's best days are long gone, and sometimes it's better to remember someone at their best rather than to see their decline in front of your very eyes. 2008 has not been a good year for Varitek, neither professionally (disregarding Lester's no-no in May and still the faint hope of a WS place) nor personally, but I still wonder if he will walk away happy with a career including 2 rings, a Little League WS and a College WS, or if he will be yet another professional athlete staying in the game just that little bit too long.

My heart does not want him to be finished, but my head suspects it is so. I hope he proves me wrong, not that he really needs to prove anything to anyone anymore.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;

(Apologies to Walt Whitman)