Former Red Sox PR Consultant Talks Relationships With Team's Front Office

In a special to BOSTON magazine, former Rasky Baerlein Senior VP Doug Bailey recounts stories from his six years as a PR consultant for the Red Sox. Bailey notes from '01-07, he "consulted with the team's owners about their public relations and strategic communications." Bailey found Red Sox President & CEO Larry Lucchino to be "nothing like his reputation as a hard-edged, demanding, volatile taskmaster." That has "certainly been the picture painted of him lately, with many observers speculating that he drove Theo Epstein from the club." Lucchino "did sometimes come across as tough, but for the most part he would invite criticism, seek input, and gather all available information before making decisions." He could be "impatient and railed against the slowness of progress or the inability to complete certain tasks on time." But Bailey notes it "didn’t appear to me that people were afraid to speak their minds," and "no one cowered in his presence." When Epstein agreed to return to the Red Sox after abruptly resigning in '05, "one of his conditions was that Lucchino’s daily media meetings be shut down." Epstein had "always had a standing invitation to attend those meetings but never came, apparently believing we were spending our time devising ways to bolster Lucchino’s image and undercut his." Bailey: "Clearly, factions were forming on Yawkey Way, roughly around one group that felt Lucchino had amassed too much power and was butting into everything, particularly baseball operations, and another that believed Epstein was more lucky than talented and owed his entire baseball existence to Lucchino. The conflict led to some tense moments and intensified the club’s already ingrained obsession with unauthorized leaks to the press." Bailey writes he "enjoyed a good working relationship with Lucchino and sometimes" with Red Sox Chair Tom Werner, but it was a "different story" with Owner John Henry. Bailey: "He was distant and aloof, and there were only rare instances in which he needed to interact with us" (BOSTON, 1/ '12 issue).

TOO MUCH INFORMATION? In Boston, Fee, Reposa & Johnson cite sources as saying that Rasky Baerlein Founder Larry Rasky is "livid" over the Boston magazine piece because he believes that Bailey "exaggerates his role with the team and discloses strategies and tactics that were supposed to be kept private." Rasky: "We take confidentiality very seriously in all client matters, so we are not talking about any of the specifics of this" (BOSTON HERALD, 1/4). Also in Boston, Shanahan & Goldstein note Bailey writes about the Red Sox owners' "cynical marketing schemes -- giving away plastic bags of 'Fenway dirt' that had never touched the Fenway field and also painting the grass green -- and details Lucchino's frequent clashes" with Epstein. The piece raises "questions about his responsibility to former clients." Bailey: "It's a fair question. But I would put most of these stories in the category of cocktail party stories. There are plenty of others I wouldn't tell." He added that there is "no danger of a similar piece about his current clients ... because they don't interest people the way the Red Sox do" (BOSTON GLOBE, 1/4).