a700hitter

It was a quote from Theo's ridiculous introduction of Dice K at the press conference announcing Dice K's signing.

^ Theo instructed that I make the correction above. ^

You may have a good point. The cheerleaders are gone. The FO apologists who kept telling us that our FO was full of intelligent people are largely gone. They couldn't take the harsh reality of the team sucking and the FO throwing another season away. Now the incompetence of the last several seasons has been laid bare for all to see and the FO has acknowledged their horrendous management by sending away three of their biggest stars. The pace is still in disarray, but the mega trade does give them an opportunity for a fresh start. I appreciate that Ben Cher has taken full responsibility. He did not blame injuries and he did not blame the past administration for leaving him "with a bigger mess than he had anticipated". He should be applauded for that honesty. Polls show that 45% of Red Sox fans would have bought a Blame Bush excuse. Where are the people who insisted that performance would revert to means etc., or that September 2011 was a statistical anomaly that couldn't be repeated and that the "real Red Sox" were the May 2011- August 2011 Red Sox? September 2011 wasn't an anomaly. They sucked, and sending out the same bunch of suck ass malcontents less your closer and set up man was not going to have a happy outcome. I am actually glad that the wheels fell off faster and more dramatically than I had anticipated, because it has brought a realization by everyone that this team had been poorly run for years and that major changes are needed. Several people said it early on like SCM and others. Several were chased from the forum for being too negative. Frankly, they were right and they weren't negative enough. This team under performed expectations of even the most cynical negative fan. The people who skewered those have disappeared one by one as the train wreck of a season became evident to everyone who wasn't in a coma. I still don't like that we chased those guys from the boards. They weren't trolls. They were just people with a different point of view and a very direct way of expressing it.

It's hard for people to get excited about more than a month of garbage time.

There is nothing wrong with Ortiz's attitude. If we had 25 guys with his attitude, we'd be just fine. People have been talking about letting him walk for about 4 or 5 seasons already. I don't think people fully appreciate what he means to our line up and how great he is. It should have become very clear how important he is during his absence. The #2 offense that survive losing Ellsbury and Crawford and Middlebrooks came to a screeching halt when it lost Papi even though Crawford and Ellsbury were back. This guy is the straw that stirs the offense.

AGon is wearing number 23 for LA. That surprises me, because Mattingly played with number 23. Mattingly is wearing number 88.

I am not crazy about either of the Uptons.

It's not bad for a game thread in the off season.

Before today it was 7.00. Before the All Star Break, his ERA was 7.04. He has been consistently very bad.

Guys that throw like he does will have a market as long as he is healthy. We may not always be able to off-load the full freight, but you can usually salary dump a pitcher to some extent who is in his early 30-s. The key isn't some confluence of events. The key is for the pitcher to be healthy. The Yankees got a small market team like the Pirates to pick up $13 million for a slug like AJ Burnett-- and AJ was pretty darn near a worse case scenario.

The only thing of note is that KC sucks. Melancon is no closer.

I agree wholeheartedly, and this coddling has not prevented injuries. It is probably a cause of injuries.

Bailey. Aceves should be the long late inning reliever. Melancon should be sent packing.

pitching, pitching, pitching -- those are the top 3 priorities.

Baily and Padilla not available and Aceves is serving a suspension.

Melancon coming in to pitch the 9th in a save situation.

I was thinking that Loney and Gomez could handle it as a platoon, and maybe Gomez could emerge to win the job. They would be a very inexpensive option.

He's the guy from the Mets for Shoppach.

No, my bad. I was referring to BC.

I know Pods is in his mid-30's, but he still has good speed. He can play all 3 OF positions with a good arm. He puts the ball in play most of the time hitting the ball hard and giving himself a chance. He's in better physical condition than most of our young guys. He knows how to play the game. I'd consider kalish trade bait this off season to package him with others to help rebuild through the trade route. Keep Bradley. Kalish is the guy that I don't see as having a very high ceiling. Pods would be happy to be a 4th OFer and I think he would be very good in that role.

We're waiting for the offseason. The rest of this season is garbage time.

The winner of the next election.

I was wondering why they had no game scheduled for today.

I don't like Hamilton's streakiness and his proneness to injury, but I would not worried that his drinking and drugs issue would be brought on by the pressures of playing in Boston. He can handle the pressures of baseball. If baseball was all there was to life, he'd have no problems. That being said, Hamilton is not what this team needs.

If we learned nothing from this trade, we learned that no contract is untradeable. If we signed Greinke and he didn't work out, we could always move an arm like that to another team.