More I think about it, Farrell might not be such a bad choice. I don't hold the two last place finishes too much against him because in both cases the Red Sox front office tanked with trades. He won with veterans (2013) and he was also able to win with a line up of internally-developed position players breaking into starting roles. The former sounds like 2018 Harper - Murphy - Zim - Wieters, while the latter sounds like Robles / Taylor / Soto / Difo / Turner / Read, some or all of whom will be the core of 2019 and after. Farrell's teams suffered from the inability to develop internal pitching options, but that's probably already addressed some with Strasburg and a good FA in Scherzer.
I did not watch enough of the Red Sox day to day to critique his tactical decisions. I think the big criticisms were in letting vets sour the clubhouse, especially post Ortiz, leading to underperformance this year.
