It appears the Red Sox have a verbal agreement with Bobby Valentine. WEEI's Alex Speier sums up the developments:
According to multiple reports, the Red Sox have reached agreement with ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine to become the 45th manager in franchise history. Mike Lynch of WCVB (via twitter) was the first to report the agreement.
Though Valentine was the last of six candidates to go through the interview process, and did so only after the Red Sox had conducted a second-round interview with Dale Sveum (at a time when he was about to receive an offer from the Cubs), the veteran of 15 years managing in the major leagues and seven more in Japan's NPB emerged as a frontrunner once he publicly entered the process.
As of Monday, the team narrowed the field to just Valentine and Gene Lamont. A report surfaced from Karl Ravech of ESPN (via twitter) on Tuesday evening that Lamont was no longer a candidate. A team source characterized that report as "not true." However, shortly after that, reports of an agreement between Valentine and the club emerged.
Valentine, 61, owns a career managerial record of 1,117-1,072. While he has never won a division title, he has twice led teams to the playoffs via the wild card, guiding the 1999 Mets to the National League Championship Series and the 2000 Mets to the World Series (where they lost in a five-game series to the Yankees). He also won the Japan Series in 2005 with the Chiba Lotte Marines.
Welcome aboard Bobby V.
