a700hitter

I saw him many seasons at Spring Training. He used to carry out the lineup card before games in full uniform and joke with the umps and whoever passed his way. He was just enjoying himself. He had such a positive attitude that it was just infectious. The last couple of years, at least, I didn't see him. I figured that he had gotten too frail. In his final year or two at Spring Training he would sit in a chair on the field and give autographs. He loved it. Remy, who has beat cancer, will carry on the mantle of the former Sox player who remains a fixture at Fenway. However, he will be doing it with a microphone and not a uniform. At the old ball park in Ft. Myers fans could walk up to the top of the grandstand behind home plate and be pretty much face to face with the announcers. In between innings, people would stand on their seats and role balls to Remy who never refused signing. He always stayed at his post knowing that people would be flockig there between innings. Pesky and Remy were the two constants for years for me at Spring Training. One is gone. God rest his soul.

Yes, that same DLowe who never threw hard, but had that groundball inducing sinker and a pretty good slider. Yes, he's a shadow of himself, but our pitching is a horror show. If nothing else, he would have been a fresh arm for a period to spell the strained pen.

After Rooster went to the Angels, he blew out his arm making one of his patented rocket throws to 1B. He tore his rotator cuff and never played SS after that. He was moved to 2nd base.

It makes no sense that the re-signed a retread like Pods and sent Kalish back to AAA rather than taking a longer look at him, but they don't make a move for DLowe when their problem has clearly been pitching. If they are giving up, I understand not getting Dlowe, but why make the move for Pods?

Good for him and screw our FO.

No one could gun the ball from the hole like Burleson, but Concepcion was better.

I think Rooster was before Trammel and Ripken and he was at the tail end of Belanger.

It will not be enough, and I don't think lester can be counted on as a top of the rotation guy unless he rebounds strongly in these last 7 weeks and shows that he can go deep into games. The bull pen ERA is completely misleading. The bull pen's performance in late and close games is one of the worst in the league.

C-- Tony Pena 1B- George Scott/Mientkiewicz 2B- Pedroia SS- Alex Gonzalez 3B- Rico/Lowell/Beltre LF- Yaz CF- Freddie Lynn/Darren Lewis RF- Evans P - Boddicker

Nomar will shed a tear today. He loved the old guy like a grand father.

R.I.P. Needle Nose. My Dad died less than 2 years ago at age 92. He used to get a big kick that Pesky was still hitting fungoes to the guys in his mid 80's.

^ This correction puts the situation into better perspective.

Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic would not have kept the ship from sinking.

A crappy Beckett and the implosion of Bard with the others performing would have had the team in the thick of the wild card race much longer, but IMO they would have imploded at the end of the season. The teams they are competing with-- Detroit, Tampa, and the Angels are much deeper in the rotation and when the gut check would come in late August and in September, our guys would have folded. Plus, the fact that 3 guys in the rotation would not be able to take us deep into games would eventually kill the bullpen. It would not have been enough and Beckett, Buchholz, Lackey, Doubront and Morales will not be enough next year. Mark it down, and I invite you to come back and tell me that I was wrong. If the FO thinks that can work, they are kidding themselves.

I don't need to look at the link. I have said it many times that I would have done what it took to get Gio Gonzalez. He's young and he signed a 5 year extension relatively cheap. I don't want to hear that it would cost Middlebrooks. The guys that the Nats gave up are not doing that well, and they kept Harper and Strasburg. Our bumbling buffoon would have had to figure out a way to keep our top prospect. I would have considered a guy like Edwin Jackson for a short term deal. He would stabilize the back of the rotation by taking his 33-35 starts and putting up innings. I would have considered Kuroda. Lots of pitchers changed laundry this off season. The Red Sox did nothing. That came back to bite them.

Just because the pitching failed in ways that were unanticipated and more drastically than anyone ever envisioned doesn't mean that the pitching wasn't thin. Anytime you pencil in two rookies in your rotation at the start of the season and one of them is not a "STRASBURG" your team is going nowhere, especially in the AL East. The Yankees tried it in 2008 with Hughes and Kennedy who were much more highly rated than Doubront or Bard and that was the only time they did not make the playoffs in 17 years. The two rookies in the starting rotation were the blaring siren that the pitching was thin. There was zero chance that they would both perform to league averages. Doubront is not a complaint. Thank goodness that he has been around league average. Otherwise, we might be the worst team in the league. Bard flamed out in record breaking spectacular fashion and they stuck with him well after it was obvoius that he couldn't do the job. Going into the season, they had absolutely no reason to think that he could be successful. His game was falling apart in Spring Training. As for the argument about the so-called big 3 performing to their standard levels, how many times have the 3 of them had 30 starts in the same season? The answer is 0. There was no reason to expect that we would get 90 starts from them this year. The contingency plans for injury to the big 3 and underperformance by the rookies was Dice K returning from surgery, Cook who can't strike out people in nursing homes, a pig lik Ohlendorf. That is not a contingency plan. This was the first year that the big three will make most of it's starts-- and they crapped the bed. Just because they under-performed as opposed to getting injured does not mean the pitching wasn't thin. There was no contingency plan for injury or under performance, and those things happen almost every year. The Yankees lost their #3 pitcher before the season started. Hughes has been terrible at times. The Yankees unlike the Red Sox were much deeper in starting pitching. Look at the Texas Rangers injuries. Colby Lewis is down. Feliz has missed the entire season and Holland has had health issues, but they have been deep enough to survive. We had no one comparable to a Feldman to step in and take a spot. No, the Sox rotation was thin and it completely blew up in their faces in ways that were unanticipated as well as ways that were entirely foreseeable. If Lester and Buch had been better, this rotation was still going to implode. It just would have happened later in the season, like it did in 2011. If they go North with the same crew next season, the result will not be much different. The only question will be when it collapses.

I agree. They were either disingenuous or stupid or some combination of the two.

I agree. They were either disingenuous or stupid or some combination of the two.

I am way short of the number of times that I mentioned the 7 run rule in the last 2 years. We are golden with 14 runs.

Fans nor the FO knew that these things would happen, but it was pretty obvious to knowledgeable fans and baseball writers and media that the Red Sox did not have enough starting pitching to be a good team. They are not even a mediocre team. They are a bad team. The Starting pitching was thin. That was not a big secret.

^ This is a 4th place team this season. Replacing Beckett with the oft-injured Johnson will not improve this team. This type of tinkering around the edges will have our boys watching the playoffs from their couches. They will miss the playoffs for the 4th consecutive years.

Crawford playing like a star.

Typical 30-40 pitch first inning for Lester. This is a horse s*** lineup that he is facing. He should be shutting them down and dominating them. This guy is still not showing signs of turning it around.

Trout was in the bag. No one compares. He has power and unbelievable speed.