Fan Griping

I’m going to rip into the fans a little for a couple of issues I have with them.

There’s no question that last night’s loss was very frustrating, but during the course of a 162 game season there are going to be games like that. Knowing this, I usually try to keep the same even-keeled temperament throughout the season. Okay, maybe I do get a little more excited when they go on a run like the one that just ended, but for the most part I don’t really get down on the team when they hit a wall and lose a couple like the last two. And I certainly don’t get down on the players.

It really bothers me the way the fans get on the players. I wrote about how they were all over Bellhorn during the playoffs last year but if it wasn’t for him (and Francona sticking with him) we may not have made it to and won the World Series.

They’ve been doing it to him again this year and now last night they got all over Foulke. Bellhorn has even admitted that it was probably bothering him and he was pressing to do well at home (he is now showing signs of coming out of it). And although Foulke won’t admit it, and is saying all of the wrong things, it’s probably bothering him too.

Why can’t the fans just lay off these guys and give them a break? Yes I know they’re playing a game and making a lot of money doing it, but they’re human and they can’t be expected to be good all the time. You know it’s killing them to perform the way they are and booing them isn’t going to make it any better.

Ballplayers say that the fans pay a lot of money to come to a game (true) so that gives them the right to boo. I think that’s crap. I don’t think the players really mean it, and I don’t think it gives the fans the right to do it. I think anyone booing a guy who is trying his best and not playing well is displaying their ignorance for the game. It’s just ridiculous and it really needs to stop, although I know it never will, which is too bad because what these guys need is support from the fans.

Johnny Damon has gained a lot of ground on Ichuro in the last week and is now less than 14,000 votes shy of getting in. Ichuro is not having a bad year (although he’s down from what we’re used to from him), but Damon is having a much better year and is more worthy of the spot. With the ground he’s been gaining, hopefully he will make it in. If he does, now that Teixeira has passed Martinez for the lead at first base, it will be the first time that I can remember every starting position being filled by a player that deserves to be there. At least in the AL, the NL is a different story.

As much as I love the idea of letting the fans vote for the starting All-Star lineup, it’s not a perfect system. It’s just a shame that so many fans who are not knowledgeable enough about the game end up voting for the most popular players, or the players they know, and not the ones that actually deserve to be there.

A perfect example of this is 3rd base in the NL. Scott Rolen is ahead in voting. I love Rolen but he has only played in 33 games because of injury and his numbers are not All-Star worthy this year. He’s a popular well known player who played for the NL champs last year and is getting votes now because of it, despite the fact that there are at least 5 players who should be ahead of him in voting, lead by Aramis Ramirez and Morgan Ensberg.

It’s also happening at shortstop, catcher, and the outfield over there. I can’t really argue with Pujols at first base, but I think Lee is a little more deserving right now.

Unfortunately there’s not really much that can be done about it. There should be some sort of test you have to take to determine if you know enough about the game before you can vote. While we’re at it, maybe we should do one for voting for president too.

Oh well, it’ll never happen and I guess we’ll just be stuck with having to deal with players getting voted to the All-Star team who shouldn’t be, and politicians being voted to the White House who shouldn’t be.

Bold Predictions

It’s funny. I get up in the morning with something in my head that I want to write about, and while perusing the sports section of The Globe, I find that one or 2 of the scribes over there have written some things similar to what I was thinking. A lot of times the game the day before dictates it so it’s not really much of a coincidence, but sometimes I have other ideas in my head and find that I wasn’t the only one. So, if you notice any similarities between what’s written here and what you read in The Globe today, I assure you, it’s purely coincidental.

Our team is on a roll. They are on the kind of streak that I don’t recall seeing very often from any team that didn’t have an NY on their caps. They’re not only winning games during that streak, they’re kicking the holy crap out of the competition. Everything is going right for them, starting pitching, bullpen, defense, hitting. When you see a team on a stretch like this, you start to think, how the hell did they ever lose and how could they possibly lose again? Well, I do anyway.

Obviously they’re not going to win every game they have left, but I am confident in saying that there is one thing they will win, the AL East. At this point, I don’t see how they can’t.

The Orioles are fading, in their defense, they are banged up pretty good right now and missing their best pitcher, Bedard, and one of the best offensive catchers in the game, Lopez, but all that really did was made them fade a little quicker than they would have.

The Yankees, like I said before, I don’t know what the heck is going on over there, but I do know that it’s not good and not likely to get better. They’re old and players that they expected to be at least good, are no better than mediocre (if you were reading any of my stuff at the beginning of the season you’ll know that I’m not surprised by any of this).

Meanwhile, here in the Fens, we have everything going right for us. We have 3 guys, Manny, Papi, and the Captain, starting the All-Star game, and at least 2 more, Damon and Clement, heading to Pittsburgh. Arguments can be made for Timlin and Nixon and since Francona’s got the final call, they could both be there if they don’t get voted in by the players.

We’re going to get a pitcher back at the All-Star break that is one of the best in the game, no other team in the league can make a trade and come up with a better move than that, and we don’t even have to do anything to get him.

Due to the crazy scheduling this year, we play a lot more games at home during the second half then we do on the road, and we all know about how much this team likes to play at Fenway.

And finally, I honestly believe that this team is actually even better than the one that won it all last year.

I won’t go quite as far as Gordon Edes did today and say that the division race will be a runaway, but I will say that it should be pretty much over by mid September and we should take it pretty handily.

We should have the best record in the AL and gain home field advantage for the first 2 rounds. I realize the White Sox are currently holding that position, but I don’t see it staying that way. They’re another team that is playing a little over their heads and should come back down to earth soon.

Since World Series home field advantage alternates between AL and NL and we had it last year; that means the NL team will have it this year. That’s okay though, it just means we will get to clinch it in Fenway this year in game four.

Obviously anything can happen in baseball, especially in the playoffs, but as I look around the Major Leagues I just don’t see a team that can beat us.

The White Sox are pretty good, but they just don’t have the pitching or experience to get past us.

The Angels should win the West, but I don’t think their pitching matches up with ours, plus they are probably no better this year than they were last year, and we know what happened to them last year against us, and that was with them getting to play the first 2 games in Anaheim.

The Twins should win the Wild Card, although Batlimore could sneak in there, but again, it all comes down to pitching. Baltimore doesn’t have it, and although Minnesota does, it just doesn’t match up to ours, Johan Santana or not (and so far he’s not the same pitcher he was last year). And although the Yankees can not be written off and could also get in there, they just don't have the mystique or karma going for them anymore.

In the NL it’s the Cardinals again. They’re just too good, and they're right back on that same pace they were on last year with the exception of the 4 game lapse in October.

The Nationals, probably the biggest surprise in baseball, don’t have what it takes to beat them, assuming they even have what it takes to hold onto the lead and get into the playoffs. And any other team that gets in there probably doesn’t either.

Sure the Cards could get taken out by a pitching match up, particularly in a short first round series, if the Mets or Braves get in there, but I don’t see it happening.

Any of this could be changed depending on what kind of moves are made at the trading deadline, but I don’t see anyone making a trade that will improve their team significantly enough to make a big difference. And again, I certainly don’t see a team being able to make a move bigger than the one we will be making at the All-Star break (Clemens would be about it, but I don’t think he’s going anywhere).

So from the perch of this observer, all things are pointing to a 2004 World Series rematch. I was kidding when I mentioned another sweep earlier. Anyone who knows anything about baseball would be insane to predict a sweep of a World Series, or any series for that matter. But after what I witnessed last year, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to convince me that the end result will be different this year.

So it looks to me as though the 2005 World Series Championship trophy will be handed out to the same ownership team as last year, and possibly in the same clubhouse as last year.

There will be another day in late October where I will be running around the city of Boston screaming my head off like a nutball with 3 million other members of Red Sox Nation. Let’s hope we get a better day for it this time.

I'm Back, Hopefully for Good

The writing bug seems to have returned so I’m back. I’m not really sure what happened, I just didn’t feel like writing anything, hopefully it will be here to stay and I’ll continue to update here on a regular basis.

I think this team is finally starting to come together. We’ve won 9 of the last 10 and picked up 2 ½ games on Baltimore in that stretch and are now only ½ game out. Okay, so the competition wasn’t the best during that stretch, we swept the hapless Reds (one of the worst teams I’ve seen play in a long time), took 2 of 3 against a very young Pittsburgh team and swept the Indians. But we’re supposed to win those games.

The Indians have a lot of young talent, pitching and hitting, have one of the best bullpens in the league, and were on a ten game winning streak before we marched into Cleveland and gave them a shot of reality. And we looked very good doing it. Everything clicked, starting pitching, bullpen getting us out of some jams, timely hitting, including late when we were down against a good bullpen.

It’s been this way for the last couple of weeks, since Sunday night in Chicago. The real test is coming up in July when we play some tough teams, Toronto, Texas, Baltimore, NY, Chicago, Minnesota, but I really think this team is on the verge of something and about to start playing the way they are capable of regardless of the competition.

Manny seems to back, as are Millar, Mueller, and Renteria. The rest were all hitting all along anyway and hitting was never a problem. Manny was actually hitting too, he just didn't have his average where it normally is.

The starting pitching seems to be turning it around. Clement has been everything we could possibly want and more, he should easily make the All-Star team. I think Miller is building up his stamina, confidence, and command, and is about to become the pitcher he was back in Houston. Wells is doing exactly what we need him to do. He’s a little inconsistent, but he’s showing signs of being the solid innings eater he’s capable of being. Wake is back on a good stretch, we can’t worry about him, we know he’ll be there in the end like he always is. Arroyo seems to have gotten over his bad stretch and is pitching well again.

And we still have Schilling on the horizon. I really feel like he’ll come back (either right before or right after the All-Star break) and be a very good pitcher for us. He may or may not be the dominant pitcher he’s been in the past, but with the way the other guys are going, we don’t really need him to be.

What we really need is the bullpen to continue on its recent trend. Foulke seems to be okay now and seems to have worked out his problems. Timlin has just been awesome and I don’t see any reason for it to stop. With the exception of Myers (who’s been very helpful), we haven’t seen any much needed consistency from the rest of them.

Mantei and Halama have not been very good, and I’m not sure it’s even possible for a Major League pitcher to pitch any worse than Embree has been pitching. I think Mantei will be okay. In my opinion, part of his problem is that he wasn’t being used enough by Francona. You can’t expect to give a guy only 1 or 2 innings a week and have him come in with great command. I know he needed to be coddled a little because of the arm problems, but now it’s time to get him some consistent work.

I think Halama and Embree are still question marks. Embree has been pitching better of late and got us out of that bases loaded no outs jam on Wednesday night, which really saved the game for us. He seems to have gotten some of his velocity back and says he’s just he’s going to abandon the breaking stuff and go back to just locating his fastball and that should straighten him. Hopefully he’s right.

I really don’t know what to make of Halama, he was really never much better than an average left-handed pitcher anyway, and now he’s just not good.

We definitely could use another arm in there, and this could be addressed at the trading deadline, but personally I think we have the solution right here. When Schilling comes back, someone has to go to the pen. I think Arroyo is the man. Not because I don’t think he deserves to start, but because I think he is best suited for the role right now. He could take a little of the load of off Timlin which will be beneficial down the stretch, and he can give us middle innings if we need them and Halama doesn’t come around.

Of course if Embree and Mantei don’t come around we will still need to do something at the trading deadline or before, but if we can get these 2 guys doing what they’re capable of and get Schilling back, we may not need to make any kind of move.

It looks like Baltimore may finally be starting to fade. I’ll give them credit, they hung around longer than I thought they would, and they still might stick it out for a while longer, but I think many of their pitchers (both starters and relievers) have been pitching a little over their heads and are now starting to come back down to earth. Their offense is great and their pitching still isn’t bad, so they will probably hang around for a while and end up with a decent record, maybe even second place depending on what kind of moves the Yankees make.

As for the Yankees, I don’t know what’s going on over there and what they’re planning on doing about it, but I will say this. I’ve never been a fan of the “Yankees Suck” chant, in fact I hate it and have never been involved in chanting or even uttering the words, but after watching them lose 3 of 4 to the lowly D-rays in which nothing went right for them, starting pitching, bullpen, defense I can honestly say the they are not very good right now, in fact, dare I say it, Yankees Suck. It probably won’t last for very long though, although I did read an interesting comment by Brian Cashman recently in which he stated that he didn’t know whether the Yankees would be buyers of sellers in July.

I find it very hard to believe that George would be willing to throw in the towel that early, or ever for that matter, particularly after all the money he spent this year. Although they’re farm system is completely depleted and they do need to address that issue sooner or later. They’re certainly not going to fill it back up just from the draft, they’ll have to dump some players as well. I just don’t see it happening but we’ll see.

That’s if for now. I’m not making any promises, but I hope to continue updating here on a regular basis again.