Fenway West - The Boston Red Sox Western Home: 5/18/08 - 5/25/08

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Who Took The Bats?

Last night the Sox had a hard time getting hits but tonight's game was worse. Someone needs to tell the equipment manager that he left the bats at Fenway, or maybe he traded 10 of them for a player. Either way, Boston really struggled at the plate tonight. Duchscherer shot down the Sox pitching a perfect game until he beaned Tek in the sixth. Big Papi had the Red Sox only hit in the seventh but Boston never got a runner to second base. Street came in for the 9th to finish off the 1 hitter for Oakland. Josh Beckett pitched well but not well enough to win this game. I did get to see an amazing catch by Ellsbury in left and a pretty good catch of a foul ball by a Sox fan a few seats away, but that was about it. Manny and Lugo had the night off so maybe they can provide a spark for the offense tomorrow.

Sox Lose 3-0 BOX SCORE

Tonight's Game

Almost time to get in the car and head down towards Oakland. After a stop at Marin Brewing Company for a few pre-game beers it will time to head to Fenway West to watch Beckett regain his form against the A's. Today's weather is way below average for this time of year and the game time temp should be in the 50's with a chance of rain. One week ago we were in the upper 90's. A coworker from Framingham, Mass. got 3 third row seats from a season ticket holder to bring himself, me and another coworker from Rhode Island to the game. I really wanted to see Manny hit #500 but it looks like a long shot. I do have tickets for tomorrow's game too but I think Tito is going to give Manny one of the games off. My 3 year old son is really excited to see Manny (his favorite player) on Sunday so I don't know how I will explain it to him if he has a day off. This will be the last trip to Oakland for the Sox this year so lets hope they put on a good show for the West Coast fans.

Young Fan Needs Your Vote

I got an email yesterday asking me to support Victoria G from Lynn, Ma
as she runs for Captain of Red Sox Kid Nation :

The Boston Red Sox are picking 12 captains for Red Sox Kid Nation. I entered the contest & wrote an essay. I was picked as 1 of 25 finalists out of over 700 kids. Now I need YOUR help because people have to vote online for the winner. I really want to be one of the captains and would like it if you would vote for me. I know I'd be a good captain because I like to help people and would work hard. I'm a HUGE Red Sox fan and really want to be a captain.

You can find more about her from her blog, make sure to vote for her here.

Boston Media Turns on The Sox

Nothing like a 1 game losing streak to bring out some overreacting negative press in the Hub. Take a look at some of the stories in this morning's papers:

The Boston Herald has an article saying how Tito can't win on the road but Grady Little could.

The ProJo has an article saying Manny's cold streak could cause the team not to sign him after the season.

It was a frustrating loss last night but nothing to signal that Manny and Tito are useless.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Winning Streak Ends With Ugly Loss To Oakland

The Red Sox had a hard time getting to Harden who was pitching a perfect game until Pedroia homered off him in the 4th. The rallies never materialized and Boston was never able to score more than one run in an inning. The A's got to Wake early scoring 3 runs in the first and 4 more in the third. Manny remains ice cold going 0-4; at this rate he may be back at Fenway when he hits #500. The Sox looked a little tired and worn out from the cross country trip striking out 12 times in the game. Josh Beckett takes the hill tomorrow in the second game of the series.

Sox lose 8-3 BOX SCORE

Tavarez Changes His Mind...Becomes A Free Agent

Last week Julian Tavarez accepted an assignment with the PawSox but Thursday he called them to say he would become a free agent. The Sox are still on the hook for his $3.5 million salary.

Magadan Gets Tossed in the 6th

Red Sox hitting coach Dave Magadan was ejected by the home plate umpire for yelling from the dugout. J.D. Drew broke a bat and when he got another one he asked if he could put some pine tar on it. The ump did not allow him to go back to the dugout. Magadan let his opinion on the umps decision known before he was tossed.

Wake Getting Pounded Early

Tim Wakefield has given up 3 runs in the first including a two run homer to Frank Thomas.

Tonight's Lineup 5/23 at Oakland

Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
Dustin Pedroia, 2B
David Ortiz, DH
Manny Ramirez, LF
Mike Lowell, 3B
Kevin Youkilis, 1B
J.D. Drew, RF
Julio Lugo, SS
Kevin Cash, C Tim Wakefield SP

Schilling Continues To Make Progress

Curt Schilling has been throwing from a distance of 100 feet and has been throwing breaking balls from 60 feet. He commented about his rehab with the following to the Boston Herald:

“We’ll just keep going with more throws and more distance. We’ll keep going until we run into a day that we can’t. But we haven’t had a bad day yet.”

Red Sox Sign 16 Year Old Australian Power Hitter

The Red Sox comb the world for new talent and believe they have found some with Boss Moanaroa, a 16 year old baseball player from Australia. There have been other Aussies that have made it to the bigs, perhaps the most well known was Yankee pitcher Graeme Lloyd, but Moanaroa is the first Maori to sign in the U.S. Red Sox scout Jon Debble said the following about Moanaroa: "The scariest thing about Boss is the fact he's never lifted a weight in his life. He's big, strong and has a great swing. The balls really bounce off the bat for him. I think he'll be really exciting.''

More Whining About Red Sox Nation

As the Red Sox continue to do well and have dedicated fans that follow their team like they are the Grateful Dead, the fans of other middle of the road teams continue to whine. Take this post by a blogger from the East Bay; it is the same thing we saw earlier this week from K.C. For bloggers of other mid/small market teams go ahead and copy the article and replace "A's" with Mariners, Rangers, or whomever your 4th place team is and write how insufferable Red Sox fans are and how much you hate them. Do what you must to distract from what is really happening to your team on the field. As for Red Sox Nation, we are OK with being the best fans in baseball.

Yankees Try To Stop Ortiz From Participating in All-Star Event

The Hankees have their panties in a wad over Big Papi being chosen to participate in the "Call Your Shot" promotion during the Home Run Derby Contest at Yankee Stadium. Apparently it is not ok with the Evil Empire to have Ortiz do something that they believe will somehow taint Babe Ruth's "called shot" in 1932. It is one thing to say they would like a A-Rod or another Yankee to be selected but they are actively trying to stop the event from happening! The insecurity level in the Bronx continues to rise.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Sox Complete 4 Game Sweep of the Royals

The Red Sox scored 11 runs today in what should have been a walk in the park after the second grand slam but the pen let the Royals back in it. Kansas City was able to bring the tying run up to the plate in the 9th before Papelbon closed the door. Dice-K pitched well enough to get the win and remains undefeated. The Red Sox have won 7 straight games and now head out to Fenway West for a 3 game series against the A's. I am lucky enough to have tickets to Saturday and Sunday's games. Fenway West contributer Dave (Red Sox Sonoma) will also be at Sunday's game so expect a great deal of updates in the coming days, including the recap of getting a high-5 from Manny after he hits #500.

Red Sox win 11-8 BOX SCORE

Mike Lowell Hits the Second Grand Slam of the Day

With 2 outs in the bottom of the sixth the Royals decided to walk Manny to load the bases. Mike Lowell made them pay with a grand slam, the second one hit today by the Sox.

J.D. Drew Hits A Grand Slam Off of Bannister in the Second

Heading into the bottom of the second inning the Sox were trailing K.C. 1-0. Manny, Lowell, and Youk all singled to load the bases and set the table for J.D. to hit one out of the yard. Sox now lead 4-1.

Today's Lineup 5/22 vs. the Royals

Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
Dustin Pedroia, 2B
David Ortiz, DH
Manny Ramirez, LF
Mike Lowell, 3B
Kevin Youkilis, 1B
J.D. Drew, RF
Kevin Cash, C
Julio Lugo, SS

Kanas City Media Keeps Whining About Being a Small Market Team

Yes the Red Sox do spend more money than the Royals but they also play in a much tougher division and have to compete with the Yankees. The Royals are a bad team because they have not bought into the moneyball idea that other small market teams have. Bartolo Colon was a free agent until spring training started, the Royals had a chance to sign him at a salary they could afford and they chose not to. Kansas City is paying Tomko $3 million this season and he was beat by Colon yesterday. The ownership and executives in Kansas City have made bad choices for the last 20 years, stop writing these whiny articles and start looking at the people running your team. By the way, who was the commissioner that has allowed so much disparity in baseball salaries? That's right it's Bud Selig; former owner of a small market team.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Sox Put it in Cruise Control With Colon Driving the Bus

El Gordo earned his first win for the Red Sox tonight after going 5 innings giving up 7 hits and 2 earned runs. The rest of the staff held the Royal scoreless until Timlin gave up a run in the 9th.. Ellsbury led off the game with a tater and even Julio Lugo got in on the action with 2 hits. Manny continues to be ice cold but as he said today he is saving #500 for the West Coast. Its nice to know that Manny wants to do something for us out here on the other side of the continent. You knew the game was out of reach for K.C. when Remy and Orsillo began discussing stealing pajamas from the flight to Japan. Things are looking good for our heroes with 6 straight wins at home, they should be able to complete the sweep with Dice-K pitching tomorrow.

Sox Win 6-3 BOX SCORE

Tonight's Lineup 5/21 vs. the Royals

J. D. Drew is given a night off

Jacoby Ellsbury RF
Dustin Pedroia 2B
David Ortiz DH
Manny Ramirez LF
Mike Lowell 3B
Kevin Youkilis 1B
Jason Varitek C
Coco Crisp CF
Julio Lugo SS

Bartolo 'el Gordo' Colon SP

El Gordo Mania Sweeps Boston

Bartolo Colon will make his Red Sox debut tonight as Boston goes for the third straight win against the Kansas City Royals.

Kansas City Blogger Tells Boston Fans to Shut Up

Chris Rasmussen at The Pitch Kansas City has posted an article entitled "Shut Up, Boston." In the article he talks about how much he hates Sox fans and how John Henry bought championships. Here is some of the whining he includes: "I am tired of my bookstore devoting half its baseball section to books about Reversing the Curse (hint: it involves a great deal of money)." Please feel free to visit his site or mail him a broom after tomorrow's game.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Total Disaster

The New York Daily News has summed up the current state of the Yankees as "total disaster." The Yankees were crushed by the O's tonight by a score of 12-2. 5 of the runs would not have scored if Jeter hadn't made a costly error.

How about this from Newsday: " The Yankees looked more like Little Leaguers at the outset and the crowd was none too pleased. Mike Mussina lasted only two-thirds of an inning, matching the shortest outing of his career, and the Yankees booted the ball around, botching routine plays in first two innings of their embarrassing 12-2 thrashing by the Orioles.

And this from the NY Post: "The Yankees converted baseball's highest cathedral into the world's largest commode last night."

Dumbass Hank's comment on the game: "There's really not much to say." Hank since you can't think of anything how about: "we suck," or "I guess we should have traded for Johan, " or "I'm sorry Joe Torre, please, please come back," or "Does anyone have Roger*s phone #?"

Pitchers Deliver Again for Sox

Justin Masterson had another good outing in his short stay in Boston but this time the pen held it giving him his first career victory. He went into the 7th giving without giving up a run and only 3 hits. After he gave up his 4th hit he was pulled and replaced by Lopez. Javier Lopez got a ground out that sent the runner to second and was the replaced by Delcarmen. Manny gave up a hit allowing Masterson's runner to score but then struck out the next batter to end the inning. Okajima came in for the 8th and got in a bases loaded jam after giving up a hit and 2 walks but was able to keep the 1 run lead and get 2 outs. Papelbon was called in for a high pressure 4 out save. He got the K to end the 8th and got the batters in order in the 9th.

Meche made hits hard to come by for the Sox but they were able to get 2 runs in the second and that was all they would need.

Sox win 2-1 BOX SCORE

Tonight's Lineup 5/20 vs. the Royals

Crisp CF
Pedroia 2B
Ortiz DH
Ramirez LF
Lowell 3B
Youkilis 1B
Drew RF
Varitek C
Lugo SS

Masterson SP

WFAN's Chris Russo Tells the Rest Of The Country What We Already Know

Schilling Reflects on Lester's No Hitter

Curt Schilling has a new post up at 38pitches.com where he discussses Lester's no hitter. Here are a few highlights:

"The thing I smiled most about, and was most proud of, well things actually, was the fact he kept within himself, never let a pitch, or an at bat get away from him, and showed why he’s a potential top of the rotation, ace kind of guy."

"It’s the thing that will always make baseball the greatest game on earth. On ANY given night you have many chances to see something you’ll never see again, or that’s never happened before, after over a 100 years of the game being played already."

I have to agree with Schilling on that, you never know what you are going to see at a baseball game...kinda like going to a Grateful Dead concert. I was at the game in Oakland last season when Schilling almost had his no hitter. The strangest thing I ever saw at a game was a guy who jumped from the upper deck at Yankee Stadium into the net behind home plate. He told reporters he did it because he thought the game was boring. I think it was because he was a drunk Yankee fan and the Sox were winning.

Tek Talks About the No Hitter

Jason Varitek caught his fourth no hitter last night. Watch his post game interview below.

Monday, May 19, 2008

LESTER THROWS A NO HITTER AGAINST K.C.

Jon Lester threw his first career no hitter against the Kansas City Royals tonight. He has faced just one more than the minimum before walking the first batter in the ninth. He then got a grounder to third advancing the runner to second for the first out in the 9th. DeJesus grounded out to Youk for the second out. The Fenway crowd cheered as Lester got a foul for strike one, a swing and a miss for strike 2, missed high with a fastball for a 1-2 count followed by another foul ball. A swinging strike ended the game and Lester had thrown the 18th no-no in Sox history.

Lester spoke after the game:

"Words can't describe it right now. I really didn't [think about pitching a no-hitter], just tried to focus on throwing one pitch at a time and going after guys and staying focused and not worrying about the score or how many hits or whatever they were doing... I can't lie, it went through my head a couple of times in the ninth but it just worked out."

You can watch each out of the no hitter below.

Final	1	2	3		4	5	6		7	8	9		R	H	E
Kansas City	0	0	0		0	0	0		0	0	0		0	0	1
Boston	0	0	5		0	0	2		0	0	x		7	5	1

Lester Has A NO-NO Thru 8

Jon Lester is mowing down the Royals and hitting 94 on the gun. 1 more inning to go.

2004 ALCS Scorecard Also Buried at New Yankee Stadium

According to the New York Times: Construction worker "Gino Castignoli, told friends that while he worked at the stadium for one day last summer he buried an official scorecard from the 2004 Yankees-Red Sox American League Championship Series." This time he is not telling anyone where it is. Not sure how true this story is but it is going to make Hank mad and there will always be speculation unless they take a jackhammer to the whole place.

Tonight's Lineup 5/19 vs. the Royals

Jacoby Ellsbury CF
Dustin Pedroia 2B
David Ortiz DH
Manny Ramirez LF
Mike Lowell 3B
Kevin Youkilis 1B
J.D Drew RF
Jason Varitek C
Julio Lugo SS

Jon Lester SP

Fisk - Munson Rivalry Recalled in New Book

An except of Rob Neyer's new book, "Big Book of Baseball Legends" is posted on ESPN.com. Neyer looks back at the rumors of Thurmon Munson intentionally dropping balls so that he could throw out batters and pass Fisk in the assist category.

104 MLB Players May Be Sopoenaed By Feds For Steroids

Remember the 2003 drug tests by MLB to determine if they needed a more stringent drug policy? The tests were supposed to be anonymous to see how ingrained PED's were in MLB. It turns out that even though the tests were intended to be anonymous the Feds have obtained the names of those players that failed the tests as part of the BALCO investigation and may subpoena them to testify. The MLBPA is trying to keep the list secret but as we all know these things always come out. The players to be subpoenaed may not necessarily be those that were listed in the Mitchell Report. Remember the Mitchell Report only included 89 players and some were not playing in 2003. There could be another round of players about to take a fall. I wonder how many more Yankees will be on this list.

Joe Girardi Countdown

With the Yankees in last place and a weekend sweep by their crosstown rivals the countdown to Joe Girardi's firing has begun. Take a look at some of the press this morning:
"Girardi has been knocked for being hyper-involved, unorthodox and (occasionally) paranoid - sort of like Tony La Russa, minus all the winning."

or this from Newsday:
"But this year feels different, for a lot of reasons. There aren't many players to feel good about and the manager, for some reason, doesn't inspire the same kind of serene confidence that his predecessor did."

In reality Joe is not going to be fired because he was Dumbass Hank's choice over Torre, the real countdown is going to be on Brian Cashman. Either way it is great when we get to watch the Yankees squirm.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

The Mets Wuz Robbed!

Carlos Delgado of the NY Mets hit a home run with 2 on in the top of the 4th inning tonight at Yankee Stadium. The ball hit the foul pole and bounced into the stands. It was ruled a home run by 3rd base umpire Mike Reilly. Derek Jeter ran over to protest. After a very brief umpire's powwow in which you can see home umpire Bob Davidson say 'foul', Reilly's call, made about 90' feet closer than Davidson's, was overturned and ruled a foul ball.
Repeated viewings of the replays show the ball clearly hitting the left field pole and bouncing into foul territory. One angle of the replays shows the pole sitting about 2' inside fair territory! One wonders how many balls have hit that pole and now have a questionable result. That'll take some research, but for now, we'll have to take a small bit of solace in that Delgado hit a run scoring single on the next pitch.
TV viewers have the advantage of instant replay that umpires do not have. This play and ensuing questionable call will only keep the discussion continuing.
Mets lead 5-2 in the bottom of the 7th. Uh, make that 11-2. (grin)

Youuuuukkkkk!!!!!

I just clicked on the 'league leaders' link at redsox.com and see that Kevin Youkilis is in the top 4 in 8 of the 9 hitting categories that were displayed, including 1st in slugging percentage. His fielding percentage while playing 1st base and right field is 1.000.

As long as he doesn't wear himself out as the season goes on, this could be a bar setting season for him! Might as well pencil him in to start at 1st on July 15th!

Offense Saves Beckett

Josh Beckett looked like he was throwing BP early in today's game giving up 4 home runs but Tito stuck with him and he ended up getting the win. The Red Sox offense answered with 4 home runs of their own including 2 by Big Papi. Boston scored 11 runs on 15 hits and completed the 3 game sweep of the Brewers. Delcarmen looked shaky in relief but got out of a jam in the 8th before Papelbon earned another save in th 9th.

Sox win 11-7 BOX SCORE

Today's Lineup 5/18 vs. the Brewers

Ellsbury rf
Pedroia 2b
Ortiz dh
Ramirez lf
Lowell 3b
Youkilis 1b
Varitek c
Crisp cf
Lugo ss

Beckett p

Masterson Tuesday, Colon Wednesday

Justin Masterson will make his second start for the Red Sox on Tuesday taking Clay Buchholz's spot, but just like last time he will be sent back down after the game to free up a roster spot. Bartolo Colon will then be called up from the PawSox and make his Red Sox debut. Get ready for el Gordo mania to sweep the Nation. Both pitchers will be facing the Kansas City Royals.

Weird Season, cont.

A quick tour around the big leagues reveals Tampa Bay is in 1st place, while the hankees, Detroit, Seattle, Milwaukee, and Colorado are all in last place. Even after all of last year's fire sales, Oakland is hot on the heels of the Halos. Neither San Francisco, Kansas City or Pittsburgh are in last place. As a matter of fact, KC and Pit are collectively only 3 games below .500. While the Giants are 10 games under .500, they're still in 3rd place ahead of the Rockies and the Pads!

Back at home, Manny thinks he’s the greatest left fielder in Red Sox history. Wait, that's not weird, that's just Manny Being....

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