Silverman: Bill James: Good time for return of numbers guru

I guess the Lady of the Dunes and Bayonne Jane Doe cases are just going to have to wait!

Like Henry, James was not a fan of the seven-year, $142 million free agent contract that former left fielder Carl Crawford received, one which was disastrous for many reasons. Of course, when the Crawford signing was made public, there were no reports of any dissension. Those reports only emerged after last September’s collapse, when Henry divulged his own dislike of that deal.

Whether or not Henry was influenced by James is unknown but we do know that while Henry maintains his active inquiry about how the club has entered this current disastrous phase, he is wasting no time making sure that those who stood by, so to speak, in the two years’ time when the club went off the rails in its player acquisition methodology get another chance.

James is getting that chance. First-year general manager Ben Cherington, a big supporter of the Crawford deal while serving under predecessor Theo Epstein, is ready — and willing — to give it to James.

“I’ve wanted to get Bill more involved since I got the job,” Cherington said. “I work with a bunch of people in Boston who are really good. We’ve got a good group of people — scouts, front office, analytic staff — that are in Boston, that I see in Boston, talk to every day and I think it’s important to have someone who is not in that environment to get advice from. And Bill would be an important part of that because besides from the way he sees the world and the way he sees the game, he’s detached enough, he’s not staring at the same stuff all the time, he’s not having the same conversation all the time and you can end up getting biased just by being in that role, so it’s important to have that kind of checks and balances.

“It’s something I’ve wanted to do is get him involved. And John is a supporter of that, too.”

Edit: Link fixed. Jim