jung

C'mon Jon must concentrate....seems like he really really has to concentrate to keep from opening up...but I guess that is to be expected...he has really worked his way to this spot over a period longer than a year....ball 2 pitch he was really open with shoulder way out of position...next pitch not much better.

WMB will you stop trying to pull that s*** outside

f*** you New York and your band box stadium.

Two outs Dustin...permission to swing for the fences

Thank God for the broken bat liner....Hopefully Jon will settle in the dugout. He was opening up much more pitching from the stretch than from the wind up.....but hey he got out of the inning.

Damn...Jon is starting to open up just a bit here....not much but a little bit.

Agreed, nothing makes a pitcher, especially a starting pitcher feel better than having your team come up and earn back the run you just gave up.

Aviles has been a disaster all year long at SS. Nobody can use a guy at the most important defensive position in baseball that butchers that position and expect not to get hurt and badly. It is the pitching which makes defense even more important because more often than not the opposition is going to hit the ball someplace. Just because the starting pitching is the biggest problem does not forgive keeping a butcher at SS. Does not excuse the Sox lack of timely hitting either. The starting pitching is only the most glaring problem on this team.

Now lets see how Jon responds to this. Will he remain with a more or less tight compact motion or will he start to loosen up and get in real trouble.

Well Lester is going more directly at the plate tonight and not throwing his body so much one way and leaving his shoulder hung out in space. Not sure if he can keep that up but this is a pretty good motion for him so far.

That might work. Beckett may have done himself a real favor in that Texas start since I think he really wants outta' this place.

Geez our bench is no match for this Yankme's team bench. Hard to find a way to the ninth inning these days.

Probably right around 200....no better but when you add in Aviles disaster at SS it does not matter...he simply gives the opponent to many outs and eventually to many runs while not hitting worth s***. Give me Iggys defense at this point.

Sabathia is really tough on LH hitters and our RH lineup basically sorta' sucks. Lester better make those 3 runs hold up....he may have to.

I expect Aviles to finish the year somewhere around 240 for a batting average

Aviles with his usual ugly swing at anything outer third or even off the plate and low.

How I would love to see the Sox hang another 3 spot on Sabathia in the 2nd

Wow Sabathia continues up in the zone and out of the zone

Ross had one mistake from Sabathia and missed it.

Sabathia up in the zone...Sox taking more advantage tonight than they did last night.

Watching Hamram play in LA, I can see how the Boston crowd would find it hard to warm up to his game. Tremendous athlete don't get me wrong but Geez as others have already said, we have enough of his type around here already. Reich on EEI rain delay radio looking for evidence of Becketts decline in 2012 in his 2011 game. I have no argument with Beckett having been the best of the rotation guys in 2011 but if the discussion is as Reich framed it, what did we see in Becketts 2011 game that would have clued you in to his 2012 I think that is not a hard question to answer. If you look at Beckett's game log and splits for 2011, his K9 was still headed south in 2011 from his peak years, something critical for a power pitcher, especially one in the AL East. His velo was already headed down through 2011 which correlates to his K9. This average of 92-91 mph on his FB was already just over 93 in 2011 as an average...also on the continual slide from his highs early in his career. He had 30 starts but only 20 decisions for a 13-7 record. So the Sox won 7 games he started where he was not involved in the decision but he took 7 of the 10 losses. He only got through 8 innings four times out of the 30 starts and at no time in August or September. As the season ground on, while his losses could be described by having one blow out inning right from the start of the season even his games the team eventually went on to win became games where he would have a blow out inning. I define a blow out inning as 3 runs or more. What was the genesis of the blow out innings. Since his velo was already down and Beckett was already making a transition away from being a power pitcher, he would lose control for as much as an entire inning and with his velo down, had no way go get out of innings. So in point of fact, while he was trying to make this transition last year, he was only succeeding up to a point. If you look at his performance this year, it is more of the same. He is still trying to make this transition away from being a power pitcher. He has more blow out innings where he is giving up the bulk of his runs. The difference is that they are more frequent this season and happening earlier in games.

I believe according to radio they have the tarp off and are working on the field at the moment.

Aviles basically accounted for 4 runs worth of sloppy play at SS. That is a direct reflection on how important SS is defensively. Sure Cook was up in the Zone and paid for it but should have been out of those early innings without giving up any runs and should have been up 4-2 not down 2-0. This has been steady and constant all year long with Aviles. Might have been harder to see early in the season but it has been there all year long. He was never better defensively...he did hit better early in the season. That is done for though. Pitchers have his number and he is not going to get much better for the remainder of the season.

They have not even uncovered the field in NY although it is only raining slightly. Apparently they are worried about early thunderstorms working their way through the area although the forecast is for thunderstorms later and less so earlier. They must be seeing something on their radars that is telling them to keep the field covered although it would appear they need to get going sooner rather than later or face a rainout. They have not announced a start time.

Ya gotta watch....the Red Sox are the best 3:30 sitcom on TV