Come on now, you can find better criticisms of Theo than "he signed Lackey instead of Jason Bay!" and "he signed Lugo instead of Rentaria!"

I honestly think one problem might be that Theo's not taking personality/psychology into account. Crawford is widely lauded as one of the hardest-working players in the league, and he spent tons of time in the cages working on his mechanics. He clearly felt the pressure of playing in Boston and from his ESPN blog posts and other media interviews, it clearly affected him-- how much hitting 2nd versus 6th/7th in the batting order hurt his confidence and base-stealing aggressiveness, the constant tinkering with his batting stance, swinging at everything in two-strike counts. Does that explain all or most of his poor performance this year? Probably not. But just like Rentaria and maybe Lackey, the media scrutiny probably hurt his play. Some guys love the pressure-cooker environment and even thrive in it (Pedroia, Papelbon). Other guys second-guess themselves and it hurts their play on the field.