Dan Duquette as Captain Sobel

I'm a huge Red Sox fan and also a big fan of both the book and HBO series Band of Brothers. For whatever reason - yesterday it occurred to me that if Dan Duquette was a character in Band of Brothers that he would have been Captain Herbert Sobel (played in the series by David Schwimmer).

Captain Sobel was responsible for the training and environment which made Easy Company into the lean-mean fighting machine they showed themselves to be in battle. The Tacoa men were Tacoa men in large part because of Captain Sobel. He was also greatly despised and had trouble dealing with people. It was hard to like Herbert Sobel.

Dan Duquette created the foundation of the first Red Sox team to win a World Series Championship in 86 years. Pedro Martinez, Manny Ramirez, Jason Varitek, Derek Lowe, Johnny Damon and Nomar Garciaparra - they were among his Tacoa men. Duquette also had a real problem dealing with people. Nobody shed any tears when the Red Sox decided to go in a different direction from Duquette. Many in fact were absolutely giddy. As giddy as the people in Easy Company when they learned that Captain Sobel would not be the one leading them into battle.

It should come as no surprise that Captain Sobel was ultimately done in by a revolt by the non-commissioned officers. They would not follow him into battle and they let their feelings known to the commanding officer (Colonel Sink - played by the great Dale Dye). Don't you think that Dan Duquette's demise was similarly sparked by players putting a bug into John Henry's ear?

Both Duquette and Sobel had to watch as their replacements became successful, beloved and famous. And both Duquette and Sobel had front row seats to watch as that happened.

Maybe my next post could be about the similarity between Theo Epstein and captain Winters?