Red Sox 2012 Season Overview

[a700hitter]

Last week I posted that it just gets better and better and as much as you want the last bit of disappointing off field bull to be the last of it....then here comes another bit to make your day.

 

In an effort to separate what is known now to have happened from what has been said:

Agons sent a message up to ownership complaining about V leaving Lester in the game for 11 on July 22nd. That prompted upper management to allow the players a complaining session and call a meeting between upper management and the players. This meeting has been confirmed by BC.

 

One report out of that meeting was that some of the players decided not to attend at all...apparently protesting players complaining to upper management and suggesting that certain star players had been dumping on V all season long in an effort to deflect criticism for this awful season from them. I don't believe that has been confirmed by anybody. The meeting apparently was led by Pedey and Agons.

Oh, I guess they were concerned that it ruined Lester's stats. Gee that's too bad. They get paid to win games and they have done a really bad job at that, but they want Bobby V to protect their stats. Too freakin bad.

[Bellhorn04]

This just in:

 

Ben Cherington has confirmed that another team meeting has been scheduled, this one for the players to choose a new manager for next year.

[jung]

Easily the most embarrassing Red Sox team in years...maybe decades. Are they serious? Complaining because they think V embarrassed Lester by leaving him in for 11 runs! Gee do you think it might have made sense for Lester not to have given up the 11 runs in the first place? I am sure that in the interest of sound investigative work...either Pedey or AGons interviewed the guys in the bull pen and they all said they were ready to go....not in the least bit in need of some rest and could have come in to relieve Lester without issue.

 

I sincerely hope upper management went to this meeting so that they could take note of the number of idiots they have on this team and incorporate that into their future plans. That said, upper management has encouraged this sort of stupidity. What did they expect?

[Orange Juiced]

Red Sox record:

 

2010: 89-73, 3rd place

2011: 90-72, 3rd place

2012: 57-59, 4th place

 

TOTAL: 236-204 (.536)

 

That's not awful, but for a $170 million payroll, you'd expect more than that. Since July 31, 2011, this team has played 172 games. They've won 81 and lost 91, for a winning percentage of .470.

 

We can blame the manager, we can blame the GM, the ownership, the players, whomever - it's a crapfest from top to bottom. But in the end, what they really have, folks, is a pretty mediocre team. Period. I wish it was different, but the facts are the facts.

[Youk Of The Nation]

This most certainly did not necessitate a new thread. Merging...now.

[Orange Juiced]

This most certainly did not necessitate a new thread. Merging...now.

 

Ok, works for me.

[agon28]

So we find ourselves in the grips of one of the most key series of the year, and what happens ? Beckett cannot get the job done. Why is he on the mound again ? Why ? Bad decision valentine. I would prefer to see anyone out there but him.....he brings in melancon, are u for real ? Melancon ? The guy does nothing but give up runs and belongs in aaa. Overnand over and over the same mistakes are made. What is going on here, what is it going to take to get rid of this crummy management and bad decisions. Why is valentine giving away games.....what is going on ? To anyone who says this is not on valentine, wake up.

[Youk Of The Nation]

Seriously, please check to see if there is an existing thread to which you can add your comments. Also, you posted this in the wrong forum. The Gamethread Forum is for Gamethreads.

[3rdManOut]

Ok sooo, getting back to this season, just heard this morning on WEEI that they are planning on brining Bard back up from Pawtuckett. Not sure when this will happen but very very soon. Expect him in the bullpen before the season is out. Well thats what they are saying anyway.

[a700hitter]

It's so hard for me to fathom that this team has not played any meaningful games for so long. I believed at the start of the season that we did not have enough pitching to see us through a successful season, but I fully expected that they would have been competitive at least until September before the lack of pitching separated us from the pack. We started the season with 3 starting pitchers. Doubront was an unknown quantity and Bard was a complete gamble. You can't break camp with that and think you have enough pitching. There were no contingency plans, none that instilled any confidence. I have heard all the arguments about foreseeability of the under performance of the so-called "big three". All that did was accelerate the fall into hyper-speed. We had 3 established starters when we broke camp. That is not a recipe for success.

 

We're officially out of it now. The ownership made that official when they sent Crawford for surgery. Many of us have known we were done long before this. People who thought we had life at the All Star break were desperately clinging to false hope. The FO has known that this was a lost season despite their public face. Their actions hollered out that the team was toast as they didn't lift a finger to reinforce the team pitching over the course of the entire season. They sacrificed the season as they pimped the 100th year anniversary celebration and bricks and so forth fully knowing they had fielded a very inferior product.

 

What is left for us as the fans? All that is left for me is hoping that the Sox can play spoilers. Knocking the Yankees out of the playoffs would be sweet, but it is a bit of a long shot. Knocking them from the division lead is not such a long shot. If the Angels and Detroit don't make the playoffs, the Yankees will have an easier path. I'd like to see them make the playoffs. We could help them by knocking out Baltimore. That would be a measure of revenge for last year. Maybe we could celebrate like unprofessional *******s like they did when they knocked us out. I'd like that. We play the Angels this week, who are in a tailspin of their own. While I always root for the Red Sox, losing to the Angels and setting them back on the winning track may not be a bad thing in the big picture.

[jung]

My hope is to see bunches of the Pawtucket guys playing together in Sox uniforms and see what happens.

 

Bring up Iggy please...although what now....I guess he sprained an ankle or something.

[kapsis21]

So we have 40 games left and chances of using playing 35-5 baseball is not humanly possible..

 

30-10 is unrealistic who am i kidding right

 

25-15 possible but that would mean the pitchers are pitching way better than they have shown this year...

 

20-20 realistic and likely

 

15-25 that would mean we would be atleast 10 games back of .500 and the worst season for me as a redsox fan.. that would plain suck..

 

I BELIEVE if they have the right lineup with Lavarnway at Catcher and Salty just pinch hitting with Papi coming back and Ciriaco playing more 3B, I really really hope they can go on a 30-10 stretch..

 

Aviles needs to be out of the lineup period.

 

so is there a chance ???

[Youk Of The Nation]

Merged. Seriously merged.

[kapsis21]

Merged. Seriously merged.

 

okay sir!

[jung]

We have been hoping for and looking forward to runs since the first losing streak of this season. Truth is, they never looked like they had a run in them.

 

Mainly they never looked like they would put together a string of decent pitching performances that would allow for a run.

 

At the start of the season, our 4 and 5 were lining up nicely with opponent 4's and 5''s and while Bard very quickly fell apart, for a period of time he was keeping us in games with opposing 5's. Same was true for Felix. At that point Buch's performances were in the main bad and we would either get a bad or good performance out of Lester and usually the opposite of whatever Lester gave us out of Beckett. By the time Buch came around, Bard had already imploded, Felix was closing in on his innings limit and Beckett and Lester were still bumbling around.

 

At that point, I give you for your viewing pleasure Cook, dice and Morales. While they were not Mo, Larry and Curly, they were not the Father, Son and Holy Ghost either. Cook has to be to fine to pitch in the AL East, dice appears to be done or close to it and Morales was just to young and inexperienced as a starter at least for this year anyway.

 

Then you have the facade of a team purported to have a really good offense. The Sox enjoyed a significant period of time when it had the important pieces in place...those were Youk/WMB, Ortiz, Pedey and Ross. AGons should have been an important piece, is paid like an important piece but while eventually putting up decent numbers, eventually turned out to be late enough for the Sox to be basically done by then. Ells looks more and more like a guy that has had his big year and Crawford is Crawford. As long as the Sox could mash they could score but put them in front of a pitcher that could control mashing and they were done. As we saw when Ells and Crawford came back, they really did not have that much of an impact in that regard.

 

I would contend that Ells biggest 2012 contributions came while ranging in CF. Crawford has had some nice moments at the plate this year but in the main...so what and he is still basically on safari in LF and this offense simply does not know how to use a Crawford up there in the 2 hole. This is not the Rays toothless offense although there were times when they looked like it. I don't see the Sox attempting to build an offense around Crawford.

 

Defensively it almost did not matter who they had out there when you have Salty catching and Aviles at SS. That defense was always going to suck and it did. While we are wondering what the record would have looked like if Beckett and Lester had performed to expectation we should also wonder what the hell it would have looked like with an actual catcher instead of an empty set of shinguards and chest protector back there.

 

All in, I don't know where this run was supposed to come from.....just based on the field performance of the team...putting aside for a moment whether the coaching could have been better or if the players were ever going to give V a chance in the first place. As for the pen, as I often said during this season, when you have to start looking at the pen to find something that is a plus or may be a plus, you are in a lotta' trouble.

 

These last forty games depending on how much the scrappy bunch from Pawtucket gets to play should finally put to rest any ideas that this team was going anywhere as I strongly suspect that they are going to fair even worse in these last 40 than they have faired in the 120 before them.

 

IMO, the challenge for the offseason will be in recognizing how truly f***ed they are....not fall into the trap laying in wait for them....that being the "gee all we had to do was get Beckett and Lester performing up to speed and we would have been great in 2012" trap. That is a version of the "September of 2011 was an anomaly" trap. More than anything else in my opinion it boils down to whether JH has the balls to do what he should do. I doubt it.

[a700hitter]

They are in a free fall. I only hope that they can manage to beat the Yankees in some of their remaining games and help knock them from the top of the division.

[Elktonnick]

They are in a free fall. I only hope that they can manage to beat the Yankees in some of their remaining games and help knock them from the top of the division.

 

If they win 15 games they will be lucky.

[jung]

I don't think it will be to much longer before we will at least get a chance to see Ciriaco, Iggy and Pedey playing 3rd through 2nd in the Sox infield. That should at least be fun to watch. Wish WMB was not hurt but since I can't change that I would just as soon see a few games with Ciriaco and Iggy on the left side of the infield.

[RedSoxfanforlife305]

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ym8Q9yxUg34/RjaSjRfqVEI/AAAAAAAAAGM/f6t8ihxAOkU/s400/crashburn.jpg

[jung]

One thing that strikes me about my own expectations for the coming month and the call ups is that while I am interested to see some of these players playing together, like Ciriago with Iggy and Pedey most of my expectations are for seeing them play together as part of a defense and run prevention. Sure I am interested to see how well Iggy can hit ML pitching but I am excited to see these guys play as an infield.

[Laser Show]

Gonzo is often overlooked, but he's also a good defender. Imagine that infield if Gonzo, Pedroia, Iggy, and Ciriaco are all on the field at the same time. It's downright scary. Then a late-inning outfield with Ellsbury, Lin, and... Kalish/Pods(?).

[jung]

AGons is an excellent defensive 1st baseman...definitely at least very good to excellent. 1st base just does not generate that much excitement defensively. Even 3rd is not as interesting as SS and then 2nd but I just want to see Ciriaco out there with Iggy and that probably means some 3rd base. Would also hope to see Ceriaco at 2nd with Iggy at SS for the fun of it.

[SoxSport]

So they suck. Off season, they will change the manager and a couple of coaches. Maybe the trainer.

And they'll still suck next year unless they get a front office that can get the right personnel on the field. Which they have failed miserably at this year--and the past couple of years. The Red Sox problem is with Henry, Lucchino and the front office.

 

The media has overlooked that they have lost the top 3 in the FO the past couple of years. You have to think that could be the crux of the problem--or close to it. Plus the lack of leadership at the very top of the organization.

[jung]

Are you kidding me? Did you just hear the NESN promo?

 

"With one month left to go, the Sox begin their final push for the post-season"

 

They must think we are completely blind or totally ignorant. Fine...promo TV games...don't talk to us about a final push for the post-season. That baby is being pushed out still-born.

[DocHolliday]

Are you kidding me? Did you just hear the NESN promo?

 

"With one month left to go, the Sox begin their final push for the post-season"

 

They must think we are completely blind or totally ignorant. Fine...promo TV games...don't talk to us about a final push for the post-season. That baby is being pushed out still-born.

 

Remember last year's promo? Soxtober or whatever cheesy tagline they could come up with.

[Station 13]

Are you kidding me? Did you just hear the NESN promo?

 

"With one month left to go, the Sox begin their final push for the post-season"

 

They must think we are completely blind or totally ignorant. Fine...promo TV games...don't talk to us about a final push for the post-season. That baby is being pushed out still-born.

 

I stopped watching NESN pre and post games 3 year ago. It's bugs the hell out of me.

[Brennan]

Aceves is 2-8 now as a "closer". We as fans will only have one more month of Red Sox baseball (a blessing in disguise) but please, by all means, keep trotting him out there to close games. After all, as loyal paying fans of your team, we deserve the best.

[a700hitter]

Aceves is 2-8 now as a "closer". We as fans will only have one more month of Red Sox baseball (a blessing in disguise) but please, by all means, keep trotting him out there to close games. After all, as loyal paying fans of your team, we deserve the best.

The players ran the asylum this year. Not long after the Youkilis debacle in which Pedey cut Bobby's legs out and the FO slapped Bobby on the wrists, Aceves told Bobby to trust him. The castrated Valentine committed to him. It was a mistake. Who the hell needs a star closer!

 

[Brennan]

And I actually like Aceves. But now he is the poster child for the Sox new strategy of systematically ruining a player by using him in the wrong role because you neglected to back yourself up in that position and didn't want to pay to keep the MLB worthy player you had there.