My fellow Red Sox fans: That's it. We're fucked.

The BBQ Pit
1

The latest news from this goddamn circus is that tonight’s starting second baseman will be … Doug Mientkewicz. No shit. We have a *first * baseman at the pivot, with Lowe and his ground ball outs and his already-shaky confidence on the mound. Francona says it’s “just to get the wheels spinning.”

My reactions to the news were, in order:

  1. WTF? Minkey is a Gold Glover where he was. That’s why we fuckin’ traded for him, ain’t it, to *improve * the team defensively?
  2. Terry Francona is a moron. The statball shit he espouses has softened his brain.
  3. It’s over, even if it doesn’t have to be.

All the injuries were overcomeable. Yes, Nixon, Reese, Williamson, and maybe even Bellhorn are out for probably the year, and it may be over for Williamson. Nomar’s gone, but hey, Theo the Boy Wonder got an underachieving Cabrera and a good-field, no hit 1B who’d lost his job to the already-legendary Justin Morneau in return. But there’s enough depth on the roster that this team still shouldn’t be slobbing along at .500 month after month. But it is.

Minky has played exactly one (1) frickin’ inning at 2B in his MLB career. All he did was tell Francona “Hey, with Youkilis out tonight, I could take over at second” and that was it. Maybe, maybe I could go along with 3B - if Harmon Killebrew and Tony Perez could do it, so could this nonhitter, and his footwork is a little better. But that isn’t the plan - in Statball, fielding is discounted because it’s hard to quantify, so what the fuck, might as well go with the hunches, and it’s really just like slow-pitch softball at the company picnic, huh?

This wasn’t supposed to happen, not with the remains of the Yawkey legacy of failure finally swept aside and a new, deep-pockets owner in place. But it’s happened anyway. The good parts are gone or going, the new guys have no fucking clue, they can’t admit that hiring a 29-year-old as GM and a pleasant fool as manager were mistakes, Pedro and Varitek and Lowe will be met by George and his checkbook as soon as they leave the park on the last day of the season, which will be in early October.

If they brought back Grady Little, at least he’d know not to leave Pedro in after 7 anymore. Can we at least do that, please?

2

Ah, a sense of normalcy has returned to this outlandish day and age in this whacked-out country, albeit a small sense of normalcy… :cool:

3

It was over the first day of spring training. Just ask any of us Yankee fans!!

4

Yup, sure enough here come the insufferable, fair-weather, bandwagon-riding, oh-so-trendy Yaaaaaaaankees fans.

Pffft.

Elvis, there’s still lots of time left to be despondent and suicidal. Don’t waste it all now. It ain’t over until the fat lady grinds the last shreds of our hope into the scattered nacho crumbs.

5

Who said I was a Yankee fan?

Chowda-heads… :rolleyes:

6

This makes no sense. Dougie is arguably the best defensive first baseman in baseball. True he couldn’t hit water if he fell off a boat lately, but he probably saves a run per game just by digging out balls at first base.

Second base is a completely different position. it takes footwork and speed and timing- skills which Mientkewicz simply isn’t known for and which take time to devlop. He’s probably going to kick some double play balls or throw one into the bullpen before he gets even an average feel and ability for the spot.

He’s a gutty guy, though and a fierce competitor (us Twins fans used to call him Dougie Baseball). It wouldn’t surprise if he was able to just will himself into adequacy at the four spot. He still belongs at first, though.

7

Just save this and recycle annually. Or as needed.

They traded Nomar to the Cubs. The Red Sox are dead to me.

8

Jeez. Doug did fine tonight, even though Delgado went out of his way to knock him down. Yeah, FrancoMa is frustrating, and the lineup changes suck, but the injuries have to be tough for everyone to deal with. Do you really think Guiterrez would have performed as well as Doug M (part 2: Electric Boogaloo) did?

Good news is, Bellhorn took BP today, and looks like he’ll be back sooner than expected. WOOHOO!

9

True, it was not a disaster. Dougie Ballgame took only 1 real chance at 2B, the rest of the time Cabrera was trying to cover so much ground that he got 2 errors himself. The wet ground slowed everything down, though. Yes, the D would have been more solid with Gutierrez at 2B, Mueller back at third, and Minkey back at the position we got him to play, and Gutierrez hits about as well, too.

Ya know, I forgot to mention Dale Sveum’s brilliant third-base coaching all season long. Most of the time, he’s gotten so many guys thrown out at the plate that he makes us long for the return of “Wave 'Em In Wendell” Kim. Last night, he stood there staring at Manny pulling up at second when nobody was covering third. At 1B Coach, we have a guy who just made it back to the team after sticking a screwdriver in his eye.

Bellhorn’s return is not going to be the answer. On the down side, Williamson gets his second Tommy John operation tomorrow, and I don’t know of any pitcher who’s made it back after that.

FTR, I’m not despondent, just pissed. And now, we’ll have to look forward to rebuilding the team around Manny, Ortiz, and Damon - and the people trusted with the job are a bright kid in over his head at GM with the Alpha Stats Geek whispering in his ear, an amiable dunce for a manager (got no feel for running a game, but he does carry a laptop), and an owner more interested in porking Katie Couric and raising ticket prices than in, you know, owning. Pedro’s first game here next year when he comes in wearing pinstripes is going to be fun.

10

In the immortal words of Bluto: “Over? Did you say over? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the German’s bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no! And it ain’t over now! Cause when the going gets tough… The tough get goin’.”

11

C’mon, give Sveum a break. It’s not like Manny ever actually looks at the coach during his advertures in baserunning.

12

Are sports pontificators in Boston ready to kill Cabrera considering his anemic hitting and poor fielding up to this point?

13

Not Cabrera, we haven’t seen him do any better so we’re not mad at him for slacking, and he’s a free agent after this season anyway. There’s a sense of, well, hollowness that Nomar’s gone, and a growing sense of anger at Francona and Epstein for mucking the team up so royally. It’s nothing compared to what will happen when Pedro and 'Tek check out, though.

14

Well, duh. I could have told you that back when they hired Francona. He completely wrecked the Phillies, my other favorite team. My entire life is nothing but suck baseball in different colors. Why do you think my husband wouldn’t let us get a house with a gas oven?

15

The general view in Boston is that they hired Francona mainly to entice Schilling to come here, because apparently he liked the guy in Philly.

16

I kicked a hole in my livingroom wall when I found out.

I’m beginning to suspect I may be taking baseball too seriously.

17

Oh, I don’t doubt it. (Don’t get me started on Schilling. I couldn’t speak his name without spitting for years. Yes, I am from Philly, why do you ask?) But let’s just call a spade a spade, shall we? I wonder sometimes if Francona could find his own ass with both hands and a flashlight on a sunny day.

18

Hehe, I love this time of year when all the Sox fans go insane. :stuck_out_tongue:

19

That was my understanding, and I still feel it was symptomatic of the “to hell with the team, suck off the stars” mentality so pervasive in pro sports.

20

Hmmm… A lot can happen in 15 days. Things looking not so bleak now.

On Baseball Tonight yesterday (after NY’s 22-0 drubbing at the hands of Cleveland) they pointed out that the Yankee starting pitchers have something like one victory in their last 18 games. The Sox, on the other hand, are red-hot (though I still hold my breath when Arroyo pitches).

Of course, NY is just trying to get us excited so they can crush us again, but at least it will keep me interested through September.