Injuries are a group decision -- medical staff, administration, player, player's agent, even family. The concept of a manager forcing an injured player to play is bizarre. Farrell managed those situations in consultation with administration and medical, but to cite this as a reason he needed to be fired is woefully uninformed
Let me rephrase and explain where I was coming from. I understand that injuries are watched carefully by the entire Red Sox management, staff, agents, etc. And nobody is forcing anybody to play. But isn't that the problem -- shouldn't a good administration (and manager) be asking players to sit when they need to?
Watching this past year, there were multiple occasions where the injured player just did not sit enough to give him a chance to adequately recover. The list is not short - Moreland, Bogaerts, Betts, Hanley. When I went back and looked at the game logs in June and July when several of those injuries occurred, at least Bogaerts and Moreland continued to play almost every day. I even read that Moreland in particular earned significant respect for playing through his injury. That's great, except that he was objectively terrible in July, as was Bogaerts.
Maybe nvalvo's approach is the better one here -- that the organisation as a whole bears responsibility for this. Or maybe JBS9 is right that the buck should stop with the manager. But something needs to change, because it didn't work this past year -- at least if the goal is a significant playoff run.
Edit: or what Paps said.