redsoxfan3

Let me ask you this, do you want him as a player who could potentially pitch in AAA to hope that he could actually turn things around, or do you want him to pitch in the majors to try to turn things around? His ERA is even worse than Buchholz. At this point I can see how you think he has something left in the tank, but if we would even consider trading for him, he needs to pitch the rest of the year in the minors. There is no room for him in this rotation. As bad as Buchholz has been this year, his last start still gives us sign of hope and Buchholz is still even putting up better results than Liriano. In your first post in this thread you said that we are in last place and that Liriano is a buy low candidate. That is true, but we are only 4.5 games out of first place with over 100 games to be played. If you are giving up hope on this season, let me remind you not to. Liriano is not a guy that you want in your rotation. I am all for acquiring this guy for the minors, but not for the majors. He will do nothing to help this team. He is one of the worst pitchers in baseball. He has had an inconsistent career. He has had two or three good years as a starting pitcher and this is his 4th year as a pitcher where he his not putting up good numbers. I don't really understand the logic for giving this guy a chance when he is clearly not better than any of our starting five now. His K-9 rate might be good, but that still does not matter if his control is not there. If anything, get this guy to pitch in AAA the rest of the year and make him compete for a spot in the rotation next Spring, other than that there is no room for this guy on our team.

Fact: June is not here. We have three more games until June is here. Fact: We are only five games out of first place in the AL East. That is not out of reach by any means. Fact: Pitching is really improving. I would consider the pitching as of late to be solid. It is not perfect, but it is definitely solid enough for us to win games. Fact: You are pessimistic and a fan that is giving up on this team with over 100 games yet to be played. That is laughable.

Even if Bradley continues to tear it up in AA, he probably finishes out the year this year in AA and then maybe starts the year next year in AAA. That means that if he has a solid year in AAA in 2013 that he could potentially be ready to have an impact in the majors in 2014, the year that Ellsbury's contract will be up. That logic could be right. Let's just hope Bradley continues this rapid pace.

I don't like that abbreviation. It is Middlebrooks. I like WMB, Will, or Middlebrooks. Brooks itself is a completely different last name. Ross is a decent OF and he is one of the best hitters in baseball when he his hot offensively. This guy can hit the ball a mile when he gets a hold of one. Middlebrooks is a solid player. I really want to keep him around in the majors. Ross and Sweeney are a good combo in RF.

1a. Beckett (last couple of starts) 1b. Lester 3. Doubront 4. Bard 5. Buchholz (he needs to keep improving)

Ellsbury is looking at an early July return. Crawford is looking for a possible return right around the All-Star Break. Kalish will probably make a June return in the minors. He is in an extended Spring Training right now, so he is actually getting some action. Ellsbury had full range of motion in his shoulder 10 days ago. Crawford is expected to start taking swings within the next couple of days. I think that ideally the future does involve Crawford, Ellsbury, and Kalish. Kalish will return to the minors this year and if he has a solid comeback after his injury, then I think we see him as a starter next year. That of course means that he does not get injured again. We are financially invested in Crawford for the next few years. He is obviously part of the future for the next few years, as long as he can avoid getting injured. Our OF needs to stay healthy. Ellsbury is a big question mark. Do we try to lock up Ellsbury long-term or do we let him walk and try to get another guy in the OF? That is a question that no one knows the answer to as of now. Sweeney and Ross are two guys in the OF that could be a good combo for a platoon role in RF. Even if Kalish starts in RF for us next year, Ross and Sweeney could be two guys that are huge for us off the bench and as depth players. Much better options than McDonald. No one can predict the OF situation. Injuries can happen at any time. I do know that Crawford is going to be around. I know that they are definitely going to give Kalish an opportunity. I might even be willing to be that they are going to try to lock up Ellsbury long-term. What is going to happen with Josh Hamilton? He is going to be a free agent after this year. Can the Red Sox make a real run to sign Hamilton? If so, that means we do not even probably offer Jacoby arbitration next year, but then again that is a long shot. I do not think Ellsbury can have another power season like he had for us last year. I do think that he can be a huge part of this team for years to come though.

I know Bard is under a lot of criticism every game he pitches. There have been a lot of valid points pointing out Bard's struggles and successes. We all knew going into the season that Bard is a work in progress as a starter. I knew that he was not going to come out and be an ace in our rotation after just a few starts. Bard has been an effective number 5 starter for us. Something that we really lacked last year. That has translated to helping us actually being able to reach .500 this year. He has given up a lot of walks and has not been that great for us, but he has been able to keep us in games this year. He will progressively get better. Once he reduces his walks and increases his strikeouts, he will become a solid starting pitcher. The problem is that we have to be patient with him. Would you rather have Bard or Lackey as the number 5 starter? One big problem with Bard is his velocity. That obviously was going to decrease due to him pitching more innings in a game, but it has decreased by more than most of us thought it would. He is not able to blow pitches by hitters like he was able to do as a reliever. He just has to find a pattern and an effective approach as a starter. I still think he has the potential to be a solid #3 or #4 starter for this team. I never once expected that he had ace potential as a starter. I do think that this team does need to keep him in the rotation, because he can be a quality starter for us every 5th game. I think there is more value out of that than him pitching in the pen. I guess that is just my opinion and I know some will agree and disagree with that.

Damnit Doubront! We need to start hitting Matusz!

Sometimes I am glad I get to mute NESN. They are talking about vesting options. Shouldn't they know what a vesting option is out of everyone?

Take that .219 average and get out of Boston.

With Ross out, I want us to keep Middlebrooks up and bring up Iglesias. Move Gonzalez to the OF on occasion and the days Gonzalez plays first, move Aviles to the OF. Give Middlebrooks the majority of playing time at 3B. Give Youk playing time at DH, 3B, and 1B. Let Papi play some 1B and DH. This could really help Youk atay healthy. We can still use his bat along with Will's bat in the lineup. This still gives Iglesias abd Middlebrooks some playing time. This will possibly allow us to get value back in a trade for Youk by the deadline. By that time Cc and Ells would probably be ready to return and we will have some depth back in the OF. Not to mention that Middlebrooks will tjen be our full time 3B (if we trade Youk) and Iglesias might be ready to take over full-time at SS, depending on how he does.

We are officially .500!!! Great comeback victory!

It looks like Beckett got the tag on him before Victorino got to the base. It was a close play and Beckett tagged him on the back. Maybe it was hard for the umpire to see the tag.

Not the batters you want coming up against Papelbon. I wish Pedroia and Papi got a shot against him.

AMERICAN LEAGUE EAST Team W L PCT GB Baltimore 25 14 .641 - Tampa Bay24 15 .615 1.0 Toronto 21 18 .538 4.0 NY Yankees20 18 .526 4.5 Boston 18 20 .474 6.5 The O's can only hang on to the lead in the AL East for so long. I really think it will be a close battle for the AL East between us, the Yanks, and Rays. I think the Jays and Orioles will be tough teams this year, but I think they are bound to round out the bottom of the East. I do not think many people would have predicted the bottom two teams in the AL East would be the Yanks and Sox after almost 40 games in. On a positive note, we are 6-1 in our last 7.

C: Jason Varitek 1B: Kevin Millar 2B: Dustin Pedroia SS: Nomar Garciaparra 3B: Mike Lowell LF: Manny Ramirez CF: Johnny Damon RF: Trot Nixon DH: David Ortiz Bench: Mark Bellhorn (2B ) Bench: Kevin Youkilis (1B, 3B ) Bench: Jacoby Ellsbury (CF) Bench: Gabe Kapler (RF)/Doug Mirabelli © SP: 1- Pedro Martinez 2- Curt Schiling 3- Josh Beckett 4- Jon Lester 5- Tim Wakefield Bullpen: Reliever- Derek Lowe Reliever- Mike Timlin Reliever- Hideki Okajima Reliever- Manny Delcarmen SU- Keith Foulke SU- Daniel Bard CL- Jonathan Papelbon This is obviously just for fun. I put some guys in there that I really like(d) and I put some guys in there based on performance. I considered players from every year, but I made a lot of my decisions based on the 2004 and 2007 World Series teams.

I think this might be an interesting topic. We have had several players during 2000-2010. We obviously won two World Series during the decade. I know there are a lot of older Sox fans and a few younger Sox fans, so this would relate to both. Position by position, what is your All-Decade Boston Red Sox team from 2000-2010? It can be anyone that you want who played on the Sox during those years, either a favorite player or a player you might not like who performed well. This is not necessarily the best players for each position, because the answers would all be the same. There are no wrong or right answers. This is just a topic for discussion of some of the present and recent past Red Sox players. After this post I will work on constructing mine. Basically, just fill this template out. I put 13 position players and 12 pitchers in the template, but feel free to only have 12 position players and 13 pitchers. For the bench players, you can add either players that were actual bench players or some guys that were actually starters when they played but you didn't put them as a starter due to someone else. It is very open. I just think the responses will be interesting.

Let's hope Youkilis is completely healthy and has a productive first few weeks back. I want to be put in a situation where we can hopefully trade Youk, bring Middlebrooks back up, and maybe get a decent prospect for Youk (maybe even some pitching help). Even if Youk performs well, then he might be worth keeping this year. I am never really in agreement with hoping that this is a player's last year with a team, but with Middlebrooks pretty much ready to take over the everyday role, I am hoping that Youk's time in Boston is done or near the end.

I didn't watch the entire game, but I did catch most of it when I was working on TV and when I got home after work. There is nothing more that I hate than when we beat ourselves. First of all, the Rays are my second most hated team next to the Yankees. I really do not like when we give up runs on a balk and give up another run due to Cody Ross having momentum carrying him backwards on a fly ball, when maybe if his momentum was carrying forward and he didn't lose the ball then that would have prevented a run. I didn't really get a chance to see how the ump was calling balls and strikes in the first seven innings, but I did get to see the ump call balls and strikes when we were up to bat in the 8th and 9th. I thought he was inconsistent and called a lot of pitches that were out of the zone for strikes. I feel like Big Papi should have been walked in the 8th. Gonzalez even came out and said that he had a problem with the umps. There were several calls in the 9th as well that screwed us. I am not one that typically likes to complain about the umping, but when you lose that close of a game, then I think some of those calls really hurt us. Who knows, if a couple of those guys got pitches that were called strikes to actually be called balls, that changes the entire at bat and we could have probably drawn some walks and had some momentum going for us. I do like the never give up attitude that this team has had this year. We have always made a run late in games this year. I really just hope we can beat the Rays today and tie the series and have some momentum going into the series against the Phillies.

He pitched 6.1 innings and only gave up 3 runs. That was his best start of the year. He pitched a decent game. It was not a great outing, but it was still good enough for us to get the win. If Bobby V would have pulled him after the 6th, he would have only given up 1 run. You cannot argue that it was not a good outing, because when you only give up three runs in a game and pitch six innings, that is not a bad start.