Rookie Hazing at Fenway

The Cleveland Indians have no shortage of players making their major league debuts and the hazing of rookie players was on display in and around Fenway tonight.

When (Trevor) Crowe walked into the visitor's locker room at Fenway Park on Friday, he saw his brand new baseball shoes sitting on a chair in front of his locker frozen into a block of ice. Even the inside of the shoes were filled with ice.

and there was this:

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Is this the same team that beat the Yanks 22-4?!

Dice-K hurled 104 pitches in 6 innings, giving up 5 hits, 3 walks, 2 runs, while striking out 7 Indians in his final tune up before the ALDS begins. Since returning from the DL, his record stands at 3-1 with a 2.22 ERA.

Ellsbury swiped #69 (3B no less) and was caught on his 2nd attempt at stealing third. The Sox had most of their usual starters in the lineup today after getting the day off yesterday. Only Drew and Papi were out today, with ‘Tek behind the dish, V-Mart at 1B, Youk at 3B, and Lowell at DH. 8 hits brought in 6 runs.

The Chinese New Year’s Bullpen Dragon was manned by Wagner, Ramirez, Bard, and Saito: 3 IP, 3 H’s, 1 BB, 0 R’s (total for the crew.) No position players pitched for the Sox today.

Sox Win 6-2 BOX SCORE

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Indians	0	0	0	0	2	0	0	0	0	2	8	3
Red Sox	1	0	3	0	0	0	2	0	0	6	8	1

One other score of note: TBY 13, NYY 4 BOX SCORE
At first I thought that NY was resting all their regular starters, but no, that was not the case. Why couldn't Sabathia pitch like that last week. Grrrrr............

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Jonny Lester is BACK!!! So good, so good, so good!

OK. So the Red Sox came into this game on a 6 game losing streak. The boys didn't NEED a win, but I am sure they wanted one. I know I wanted one. This game was the first time back on the mound for Jon Lester since he was hit above the knee at Yankee Stadium. Pretty much everyone was waiting with baited breath to see how Lester was going to bounce back. People were concerned about Lester being hit and also about how Lester pitched in the few innings before he left the game. So, this game that doesn't mean anything...seemed all kinds of important.

The offense got Lester out to a quick lead with Youk's sac fly in the 1st inning. Ortiz got his 97th RBI in the 3rd on a line drive, followed by a RBI single by JayBay to have the Red Sox leading 3-0. The drama of the evening was the Tribe's pitcher, Carrasco being hit by a line drive in the 4th that was eerily reminiscent to Jonny Lester being hit. He left the game and reports are that he is ok. Thank goodness for that. The bullpen came in for the Indians and took care of business for Carrasco.

So, how did Lester do???

Lester's line. 6.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 7 K on 84 pitches. Basically...Lester was all chuck full of awesome and showed that not only is he back, but he seems READY for the post season. Lester struck out the side in the 5th and his off speed pitches just looked nasty. Lester walked the first batter in the 7th inning and Tito took him out. Bard came in...gave up a hit...and hit a batter. With the bases loaded and one out, it looked like the Red Sox might be in trouble. Bard lucked out with an awesome Gonzo/Pedey DP and got out of the inning without any damage done. Wagner followed with a 1-2-3 in the 8th and Pap closed out the 9th with an awesome 1-2-3 of his own. Pap looked like he is locked and ready for October...throwing 11 pitches, 9 for strikes to get through the inning.



Yeah. It officially feels like Soxtober.

Sox WIN 3-0. BOX SCORE

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Indians	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	0
Red Sox	1	0	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	12	0

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Victor Martinez about to traded to Red Sox

From MLB Rumors:

USA Today's Bob Nightengale via Twitter: the Red Sox are about to acquire first baseman/catcher Victor Martinez from the Indians. Ed Price of AOL Fanhouse, trying to confirm, says it "looks good." FOX Sports agrees, and notes a lack of a third team involved. They also believe this kills the Adrian Gonzalez talks.

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V-Mart still a possibilty

ESPN is reporting just after noon EDT today, that the Red Sox and Indians are working on a deal that would involve Martinez and Buchholz. ESPN also reports that little or no progress has been made with the deals involving Halladay and Gonzalez, as both the Blue Jays and Padres continue to ask for steep prices on them.

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Red Sox Offers Turned Down By Tribe

The Red Sox made an offer of Clay Buchholz for Victor Martinez. When the Indians turned that down they offered Michael Bowden and Justin Masterson and an outfield prospect for Martinez but that was turned down as well. Theo was going after Martinez very hard an willing to pay a steep price but it is obvious the Indians are charging an outrageous amount for thier catcher.

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Tribe Thumpin'

What happens when you take Ellsbury, Ortiz, and Youkilis out of the line up all on the same day? No, the Sox don't get whipped, the rest of the bench pours it on, which is what they did in a 13-3 Tribe thumpin' tonight. As previously reported, 12 of those runs came in the 6th inning before 1 out was even registered, thereby setting a new AL record. All 9 starters scored at least 1 run, all 9 starters got on base at least once. With 3 regular starters out of the line up tonight, Tito got creative for the line up using Lugo as the DH and leading off, Bay in the #3 spot and Lowell- clean up.

The hot bats tonight:
Lugo (Yes! Lugo!)~ 3/5, 3 runs
Pedroia~ 2/4, 2 runs, 3 RBI's
Bay~ 2/5, 2 runs, 4 RBI's
Bailey~ 2/4, 1 run, 2 RBI's

Wakefield had yet another quality start: 6 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 4 BB, 3 K, 1 WP, 101 pitches thrown. Lopez allowed another run in his only inning. Delcarmen before him and Saito after him threw scoreless innings.

Wakefield is now 4-1, with a 2.92 ERA.

SOX win 13-3 BOX SCORE

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Red Sox Set New AL Record

Before an out was made in the sixth inning of tonight's game at Fenway against the Cleveland Indians, the Red Sox scored 12 runs in the inning for an American League record.

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Holy Lopsided Score Batman!

The score from New York today: 22-4

No, not football. Yes, baseball. The 2009 New York Yankees have set a new franchise low record by allowing 14, yes that's 1-4, fourteen Cleveland Indians to make a round trip around the diamond in one inning at the brand spanking new Yankee Stadium. Former ace of the Lowlanders, Chien-Ming Wang was chased off to the showers in the 2nd inning after allowing 8 runs. Anthony Claggett (who?) came in and promptly allowed another 6 runs in that inning, and another 2 runs before he got the hook as well. The Indians would not relent until they had scored a total of 22 runs by the end of the game. The Indians belted 6 home runs in the game, including a grand tater by Asdrubal Cabrera. The Yanks should have sent in Nick Swisher instead of Claggett (who?)

Now I'm wondering where the Red Sox can get a few cans of that whoop-ass that Cleveland found.

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming: BOS-5 BAL-0 heading into the 4th.

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Beckett didn't bring is best stuff today, but...

Sox were down 4-2 going into the 7th inning. Beckett threw 105 pitches in 6 innings, struck out 6, but allowed 4 ER's and 7 hits. He only walked 1 batter, but hit 2 others. Not looking good getting deep into the 9th inning, down 4-3, 2 outs. But wait! There's more! Youk singles! Bay doubles! SOAB! Lowrie strikes out swinging to kill the rally.

This post ain't over yet. Tampa Bay beat the O's 4-2. (Kevin Millar popped out to end their rally, as well as not hitting that last HR at Yankee Stadium like he said he was going to do.)

SOAB is right. Sox are now 2.5 games behind the Ray's (I thought they were supposed to go belly up in September?) On the brighter side, Masterson and Okajima pitched 2.2 innings: no hits, no runs, no walks, 3 strikeouts.

Lookin' like it might be Sox and Halo's in the ALDS. Let's hope Tito has a few cards up his sleeve for that series.

Sox lose 4-3 BOX SCORE

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Tonight's Lineup.... Coco, Jacoby and Lowrie Too

Jacoby will be in right for Drew, Casey gets a day off

Coco Crisp, CF
Dustin Pedroia, 2B
David Ortiz, DH
Manny Ramirez, LF
Kevin Youkilis, 1B
Jacoby Ellsbury, RF
Julio Lugo, SS
Jed Lowrie, 3B
Kevin Cash, C

P -- Tim Wakefield

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Manny Drives Cleveland Sport Writers to Despair

Cleveland sports writers must have had a late night. I'm sure more than one of them had their articles just about ready for the presses before Joe Borowski came to the mound and Manny Ramirez came up to bat.

They must have been readying headlines like, "Tribe Win Erases Pain of ALCS" or "This Year It's Our Turn."

After hearing boos all night from the Cleveland crowd, Manny had the last word with a towering shot. Then Cleveland Sports writers hit the delete button on their cheery articles and settled in to a late night slog of reporting doom and gloom.

The bitterness and despair are apparent in Cleveland Plain Dealer Bill Livingston's column, which he titled, "Ramirez continues the Cleveland Indian's Nightmare." I don't think that is the column that he was planning to write in the 8th. He ends it this way:

"The Indians, now into their Diamond Jubilee celebration of the 1948 World Series victory, have never had the national following of the Red Sox. Diamonds are forever. So is futility here.
The only time the Atlanta Braves won the World Series, it was against the Indians.

The first time a team went into the bottom of the ninth inning in the seventh game of the World Series and lost, it was the Indians.

The Indians went 41 years in the wilderness without sniffing the playoffs. Hah! We scoff at Moses!

After games like Monday, the Promised Land looks further away than the ball Ramirez hit off Joe Boo."

All is well that ends well. Go Sox!

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