From the comments section at U.S.S. Mariner:
I was listening to XM Radio the other day, and Kevin Kennedy was criticizing Bill James because "He said that the 8th inning is more important than the 9th [and they tried a bullpen by committee and it didn't work]." He went on to talk about how once they got Keith Foulke, an established closer, they took off and found success. This was quite a while ago, and people within baseball still point to it as a triumph of hidebound traditional reasoning over creative, sabrmetric [sic] analysis.
Rafael Soriano is a fantastic pitcher who makes the Rays better and clearly improves the bullpen, which was a weak spot when all was said and done last year. He's good. We're all glad we have him. Hopefully he's going to rack up saves, strikeouts, and saliva like nobody's business.
That being said, he's going to be overrated as much as any player in recent memory. That's not his fault and shouldn't be held against him. It's just something you have to accept when the Sori-storm arrives.
Kevin Kennedy is going to rant and rave about this guy for the wrong reasons; those being A) his role B) his experience. There's a reason I don't particularly care for his analysis skills, and this fits right in. He's a generic analyst who latches onto old timey wisdom without ever challenging the conventional. He's also a generic baseball manager.
This makes me miss Joe Magrane and adore Joe Maddon even more.