D-Lowe and Pokey
During all of the hoopla of the past few days a couple of more World Champions have officially left town.
Pokey
In Spring Training Pokey was slated to become our starting second baseman, but Nomar’s injury changed that. I never had any problems with Pokey, but personally I thought he was much better suited as a backup middle infielder. I felt Bellhorn should have been the starting second baseman from day one, despite his terrible spring.
As it turns out, it ended up working out that way while Pokey filled in at short for Nomar. We won a lot of games early on with Pokey doing an unbelievable job defensively and surprising a little with the bat.
He then managed to get hurt (which has been one of the knocks on him for his entire career). First the rib cage muscle pull, then the jammed thumb, then Nomar came back, followed by Cabrera and he was never more than a defensive replacement from that point on.
Sunday night, Red Sox This Week showed a nice highlight tribute to Pokey. While watching it I was reminded of just how great of a defensive wiz he is. It was certainly a lot of fun watching him make those plays, and he certainly played his part in getting us to the playoffs.
Good luck to him in Seattle.
D-Lowe
I think it’s safe to say that we made it to the playoffs despite the terrible regular season he had, AND we would not have won the whole thing without him.
That seems to be a reflection of his entire career to this point. He came here in “97” with Tek in the Slocumb deal, which was certainly the greatest trade Duquette ever made, and quite possibly one of the greatest and most lopsided deals in baseball history. He started off as a set up guy for Tom Gordon and then took over the closer role when Gordon left.
He was awesome in that role in 2000, saving 42 games but then he slipped in “01” and they decided to work on turning him back into a starter for “02” after trading for Oogi.
He started off 2002 spectacularly with a No-No and ended it with 21 wins and a 2.58 ERA. He followed that up with 17 more wins in “03” although his ERA increased by nearly 2 runs to 4.47. He was incredible in the playoff series against the A’s, starting one game and relieving in 2 others, including getting the save in the clincher, which he will always be remembered for the “crotch grab” toward the A’s bullpen as he celebrated the victory on the mound (I still don’t get that one).
The Yankees crushed him in the next round and that seemed to carry over with him into, and for, the entire “04” regular season, where he posted a 5.42 ERA although, thanks to the offense, he still managed to win 14 games. And of course we all know what he did in the playoffs last season.
He claims Sox management made it clear to him early in the off-season that they had no intention of signing him, but I don’t agree. They made it clear to him that they had no intention of giving him the kind of money they knew he was going to ask for. I agree with them. It’s tough to give a guy that kind of money when you just have no idea what to expect from him. At any given time this guy could be anywhere from absolutely fantastic to absolutely terrible, or anywhere in between. I’ve never seen anything like it in all of my years of watching baseball.
The size and length of the contract he got from LA seems like an act of desperation to me.
I would not have had a problem with bringing back D-Lowe for a reasonable amount of money on a 1 or 2 year deal, but he knew he would find someone to give him a lot more money for a lot more time so the Sox just never bothered after he turned down their initial offer.
It’s too bad, I liked him. No matter how bad he was going I always got the impression that he was giving it everything he had. For the most part, he never had anything bad to say about anyone and never disrupted anything, and I know for a fact that he was very well liked in the clubhouse. It was mentioned all the time, plus Bill Mueller told me.
I think we got a very good replacement for him in Matt Clement.
Thanks for the World Championship and good luck in LA.
Pokey
In Spring Training Pokey was slated to become our starting second baseman, but Nomar’s injury changed that. I never had any problems with Pokey, but personally I thought he was much better suited as a backup middle infielder. I felt Bellhorn should have been the starting second baseman from day one, despite his terrible spring.
As it turns out, it ended up working out that way while Pokey filled in at short for Nomar. We won a lot of games early on with Pokey doing an unbelievable job defensively and surprising a little with the bat.
He then managed to get hurt (which has been one of the knocks on him for his entire career). First the rib cage muscle pull, then the jammed thumb, then Nomar came back, followed by Cabrera and he was never more than a defensive replacement from that point on.
Sunday night, Red Sox This Week showed a nice highlight tribute to Pokey. While watching it I was reminded of just how great of a defensive wiz he is. It was certainly a lot of fun watching him make those plays, and he certainly played his part in getting us to the playoffs.
Good luck to him in Seattle.
D-Lowe
I think it’s safe to say that we made it to the playoffs despite the terrible regular season he had, AND we would not have won the whole thing without him.
That seems to be a reflection of his entire career to this point. He came here in “97” with Tek in the Slocumb deal, which was certainly the greatest trade Duquette ever made, and quite possibly one of the greatest and most lopsided deals in baseball history. He started off as a set up guy for Tom Gordon and then took over the closer role when Gordon left.
He was awesome in that role in 2000, saving 42 games but then he slipped in “01” and they decided to work on turning him back into a starter for “02” after trading for Oogi.
He started off 2002 spectacularly with a No-No and ended it with 21 wins and a 2.58 ERA. He followed that up with 17 more wins in “03” although his ERA increased by nearly 2 runs to 4.47. He was incredible in the playoff series against the A’s, starting one game and relieving in 2 others, including getting the save in the clincher, which he will always be remembered for the “crotch grab” toward the A’s bullpen as he celebrated the victory on the mound (I still don’t get that one).
The Yankees crushed him in the next round and that seemed to carry over with him into, and for, the entire “04” regular season, where he posted a 5.42 ERA although, thanks to the offense, he still managed to win 14 games. And of course we all know what he did in the playoffs last season.
He claims Sox management made it clear to him early in the off-season that they had no intention of signing him, but I don’t agree. They made it clear to him that they had no intention of giving him the kind of money they knew he was going to ask for. I agree with them. It’s tough to give a guy that kind of money when you just have no idea what to expect from him. At any given time this guy could be anywhere from absolutely fantastic to absolutely terrible, or anywhere in between. I’ve never seen anything like it in all of my years of watching baseball.
The size and length of the contract he got from LA seems like an act of desperation to me.
I would not have had a problem with bringing back D-Lowe for a reasonable amount of money on a 1 or 2 year deal, but he knew he would find someone to give him a lot more money for a lot more time so the Sox just never bothered after he turned down their initial offer.
It’s too bad, I liked him. No matter how bad he was going I always got the impression that he was giving it everything he had. For the most part, he never had anything bad to say about anyone and never disrupted anything, and I know for a fact that he was very well liked in the clubhouse. It was mentioned all the time, plus Bill Mueller told me.
I think we got a very good replacement for him in Matt Clement.
Thanks for the World Championship and good luck in LA.
posted by Bob at 1/13/2005 09:24:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home