jacksonianmarch

Wells is a great pitcher when he is healthy. He can win games and eat innings especially down the stretch. The problem is, I do not think he will ever be healthy again.

Rogers Hornsby was one of the top 5 best players ever. He is the best 2b ever. Look at the #s, he was amazing.

Honestly, no yankee fan, sox fan, mets fan, or LA fan should ever whine about the need for a salary cap. Some people say it should be 110 mil. Why is that? So that the one team that is above it has to be reigned in? Nobody will agree to that kind of thing, especially with the yankees and sox essentially drawing record crowds everywhere they go, and that doesn't happen if the yankees or sox start a season with Cairo, Stern and Stinnett in the starting lineup. At the same time, the only way it can be instituted is by rolling back all the salaries in the league so that the yankees can get below it immediately and you would essentially be freeing them of some real tankers of contracts. The Yankees play with a huge payroll because it is allowed. The Yankees are going to have their new stadium financed with revenue sharing dollars because it is allowed. The Yankees will also add hotels in the area that they will get cuts of, which is allowed and not included under the revenue sharing agreement. Regardless, the yankees stay above the cap because they can and they make it work. If you forcibly made them stay under a cap, you would have to free them of some bad contracts and they would figure out how to win with the rules as is anyway. You have to give the yankees credit where it is due, have they created a seemingly unfair advantage in comparison to the bottom 3rd of the league, absolutely. Are they smart, hell yeah, they would figure something out to recreate the disadvantage.

The one thing I truly respect about the 2006 Yankees is their ability to come back from a bad loss. On Monday night, they had plenty of opportunities to win, they handed the ball to their closer in the 9th and they still lost the game. A bad loss against a team they are competing against in the standings. So what do they do? They come out the next night and no-hit them for 6 innings and run up a 7 run lead early. Yeah, the chisox came back, but Mo was vintage and the yankees won. Since the the yankees suffered a 19-1 drubbing at the hands of the Guardians, they have the best record in baseball (21-8). This is what good teams do, the sox should take notes. The Red Sox on the other hand are a team that lets bad losses linger. It seems that every time they lose a heartbreaker, they take a couple days to respond, and those couple days turn into losses. The fact that they didnt take the first loss to the royAAAls personally is shocking. The fact that the royAAAls then came back and beat their stud in the pen the next night is even worse for them. What can the sox do for an encore? Will they get trounced with their ace on the hill? I'd highly doubt that, but with the way things have been going, I wouldnt be shocked.

Nice line, Wes Mantooth. Fact is, the way the Yankees got their reinforcements is what amazes me. Abreu, a perennial .420+OBP, .300+AVG, 20+HR, 100+RBI, 100+R, 25+SB, .900+OPS guy with a pitcher who has averaged over 6 innings per start for 4 players. One 19 yr old draft pick from last yr who cannot hit. One 27yr old lefty reliever who will be a lefty specialist one day. One 18 yr old catcher who is barely hitting his weight. One young middle reliever who will never see the light of day in the MLB. That was a free trade. That leaves their rising farm system essentially untouched and adds to their talent at the MLB level. It was almost unfair.

Yes, the Yankees got swept by the Royals last yr. But, that occured in May if I am not mistaken. That left them plenty of time to come back. At the same time, they needed one of the hottest 40 game stretches in their history to come back to tie for the division and they had 2 nobody's come from nowhere and combine to go 17-3 with an era near 3. That doesnt happen routinely. There is no positive spin for the sox on this one, these last 2 games have been horrid for them.

every closer has a streak of being ineffective. How they come out of it determines how good they will be.

Lets not use the injuries excuse. The team that is cruising right now ahead of the sox had a .325 hitter on the DL for 5 weeks, 2 perennial MVP candidates on the DL since early May, a 40mil starter on the DL the entire yr, the captain banged up, the CFer with a broken foot and a bad groin, a catcher with a bad knee, and a roided 1b with a multitude of small injuries. The sox injuries are very small in comparison to the yankees, the excuse doesnt work.

Lets just remember, the sox were up 4 in the loss column 3 weeks ago. They have dropped 8 games in the standings in 3 weeks playing against the dregs of the bigs. This is bad for the sox.

I said before that if the Red Sox lost ground during the royals series that they will essentially be done. I know the sox have a ton of games left with the yankees, but you have to see that the yankees are getting tough away games out of the way while the sox are getting gimme games out of the way. The Yankees strength of schedule is decreasing by the day while the sox sos is getting higher. The Sox have played 9 consecutive games against teams that are either in last or second to last place in their divisions. 7 of those games were at home. The sox are 3-6 in those games. Playoff teams dont lose those games.

4 games back in the loss column in the AL East. Ouch.

Sorry dude. You should never say that.

huh, what just happened?

DelTimPap? for the future?

MDC coming in.

Beckett is over 100 pitches. Will we see another outing from Freddy or from Koopa (Rudy reminds me of Koopa from Mario Bros). We'll see.

No Hughes. He is a guy who is essentially the jewel of the farm system in front of a "right now" kind of crowd. If the kid comes up and gets pounded against the hated rivals, he will be labelled as a bust after one game. Lets him simmer in the minors and bring him up when necessary next yr.

What about Clippard?

can I get some lotto numbers?

That run for Beckett should be earned. You cannot assume a DP on Shealy's groundball. The fact that there were runners on third makes Beckett look bad. He should dominate the RoyAAAls.

Randy is such an enigma. His last 2 starts were total stinkers and he couldnt even come close to control. Today, he is making them all look silly. If he finds consistency, this race is over.

Yeah, Lowell hit into a DP. Oh well. How the HELL does Beckett give up 3 runs in 4 innings to these stiffs. The sox should have a comfortable lead right now. I have a feeling that the sox are in trouble tonight.

Look at Arroyo's QS% on the season or even last season. Compare that to the combination of Wells, Lester, Johnson, Clement, etc etc etc. He blows em all away.

Put it this way. If the sox do not make the Pena deal, then they can afford to make the deal for Oswalt. They would then have Schilling, Beckett, Oswalt, Arroyo and Wells. You could book the rings right now with that rotation.

I was talking about the pitchers. Pedroia will be at 2nd next yr, no doubt in my mind.