Gonzalez: "The Source Is Inaccurate"

UPDATE: Extensive Larry Lucchino quotes (in comments). He stated Valentine will absolutely not be fired this season. As far as the Red Sox making the playoffs, he wanted to be "realistic" about the next 44 games: "If that happens we'll be talking about a comeback for the ages."

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WEEI's Rob Bradford talked to Adrian Gonzalez about Jeff Passan's report of the players/ownership meeting on July 26. Gonzalez says the portrayal of him as a vocal ringleader is false.

The source is inaccurate. It says that I was animated and one of the most vocal guys in the meeting, and that's false. ... Absolutely [I was surprised at the report], because, first of all, if somebody is going to try and be an unnamed source they better be right with whatever they say. This is putting our integrity and everything about us out there, and that's just unfair. ... I just know I was one of the least vocal guys there.

Gonzalez mentions a single source; Passan said he had three sources for the story. GM Ben Cherington, who is quoted in the original Yahoo! article, may have been one of them.

Just like every story around here, there are parts that are true, and parts that are false. I think it's wrong for the fans to get half of a story, half of the truth. Our focus has been to just go out and play ball and just worry about baseball. Things like this come up that we have to respond to, but at the end of the day it's about playing ball. ... Ballplayers get frustrated when things aren't 100 percent accurate, because then it's just making people perceive things that aren't true.

John Henry stated that it was he who called the meeting, not a group of players, during the Yankees series.

[N]o one in that meeting at any time took the position that Bobby should be or needed to be replaced. ... Players felt responsible for the record. They weren't blaming injuries or anyone but themselves. At the same time they openly spoke about what could improve in addition to their play.

Bobby Valentine was on The Big Show yesterday and described himself as being "four months into a very trying situation".

[T]here is a lot of emotion flying around here these days. One of the things I was discussing with one of the players was that all of this noise is one of the reasons players don't want to sign here, because they don't have to deal with this in other markets. They don't worry about the drama of the day. They can just go out and play baseball.

The whole "players don't want to play in Boston" is not supported by the facts. John Lackey and Carl Crawford both signed deals as free agents to play in Boston, and Gonzalez agreed to a long-term deal to stay with the Red Sox.

Re the recently-surfaced clip of Jon Lester throwing sunflower seeds in first base coach Alex Ochoa's face during an April game against the White Sox, Ochoa says it was nothing but a joke.