jung

As confusing as it appears it also appears that nobody steps forward. Nobody acknowledges what is going on and the seats at Fenway are now so full of Sweet Caroline singing....wave making loons that would not know a hit and run from a run and hit that they blissfully sit there happy for the "Fenway Experience". Nobody says anything. God forbid we should bruise some egos. It is without question the most bizarre sports dynamic I have ever witnessed. No disrespect to our forum members that attend. But there are far to few of us and way to many of them. The point being I am not sure that management will ever be compelled to clean this mess up. That team deserved to be booed off the field tonight and last night....booed off the field...driven from the field by a crescendo of boos. Did you hear any? I didn't. V apparently thinks he is on a short leash. If I were him and I cannot believe he does not see what I see....I would go all in and finally tell this bunch what it is and what it is not....cause this is going to get so ugly by year end that his job is going to be lost anyway. They aren't going to win one of the WC spots. They are going to fall completely apart unless there is a drastic change in the way they play day in and day out. As a team they act like fans. It is OK for the folks that have wanted to see the best in these guys to hold onto that view...hey we are fans...we are entitled to either take a more stark view maybe like mine or a more optimistic view. But they can't or at least they should not. If somebody is now going to tell me that they are just going to blissfully continue like this.....man I don't know what to say to that. I would only have one thing actually to say to that....JH, sell the team or clean that stench out from top to bottom starting with s***-heads like Beckett that don't want to be here any longer.

What is disappointing is that it should be clear by now that nobody either in management or as a player has stepped forward and forced this bunch of idiots to recognize that their complete lack of team play is so clearly evident and so clearly damaging. All of this rah rah crap shredding jerseys and tossing gatorade after a regular season win (give me a break) is a facade. They don't play as a team. They don't help each other on the field, where it counts. If a guy comes to the plate in a situation where he needs to hit behind the runner but he likes to pull...guess what he is doing. He is going to try to pull regardless of whether or not he even gets a pitch he can pull. This so called team has so few guys that come to the plate intending to try to improve the "teams" prospects to score. Most of these guys come to the plate looking to do what they want to do and if it so happens that the Sox can score off of that ....fine. Nava tries, Pedey tries, Ells tries, Ciriaco tries and Ortiz tries. Shop will try although he does not have much talent to work with. Every single other guy that comes to the plate could give a rats ass about what the team needs at that specific point in the game. Aviles is a joke in this particular regard. Aviles won't even waste pitches when he can't pull the ball. Aviles will try to pull balls that can't be pulled. Agons is a joke in this regard. Even Ross for all we like about him is a dead pull hitter and really does not have a way to do much else nor does he try to do much else. WMB may change cause he is young but he simply does what he wants to do at the plate regardless of what the team needs at any given time in the game. The guys I mentioned early on are all they have for guys that actually will try to make plate appearances within a team offensive effort or concept but they are simply overwhelmed by the number of guys that don't and won't. And this lack of a team offensive concept is not this team's biggest problem. Starting pitching is this team's biggest problem. This series with the Jays may have cost them more than they know. If I were the FO, I would not lift a finger to help this bunch. I would not spend a single prospect to get a Garza or anybody else for that matter as they will need a complete metamorphosis at least in my view. We are seeing what it means to be a bunch of talented ballplayers that do not play baseball as a team.

I am afraid so. Getting those players back was not going to and has not changed what the Sox do not do and this bunch is defined by what they do not do. It is embarrassing to see the level to which they are being outplayed across the board. Yes the most significant issue is the starting pitching but the lack of a concerted identifiable "team" offensive effort is remarkable in its complete absence. It is a brute force offense with runs completely derived from the completely independent hitting efforts of its members. That is exactly why they can so often get three hits in a row and score no runs while its opponents can often score runs without getting a single hit. The difference is so stark at this point that it cannot be denied although I suppose they can ignore it. I certainly have yet to see any effort to change it. To say nothing of its defense which so often gives the opponent extra outs to play with.

Whether Ells is in or Ortiz is out...it just does not matter, not to any great degree....this team is still described more by the things it does not do more than the things that it does do. Ultimately it is the things it does not do that are its undoing starting with sucky starting pitching, followed by a not to sterling defense, followed by the lack of any recognizable team offensive effort which correlates directly to their inability to manufacture runs or get hits at the right time and in the right places and their feast or famine run production. It still looks to me like the most mismatched, misaligned bunch of players I have ever seen in major league uniforms. It simply is not a baseball team. It is a bunch of baseball players wearing the same laundry.

As critical as I have been of this team even I am having a hard time believing we are this bad. Holy Cow!

Roberts numbers have really been up and down through that whole period and since. Maybe he didn't use for any extended period of time which is his claim. I just don't think you can look at a guy's changing numbers and immediately jump to the conclusion that he is juicing and as far as hitters go, HGH may not actually do much. You need something that will increase your strength more rapidly as you work out. For a hitter I suspect steroids would still be the way to go if you wanted to increase the pop in your bat. I have to admit I am totally frustrated with both baseball and the players association. Baseball needs to have an airtight process which they don't and the players association needs to stop claiming that it has its player's best interests at heart when they clearly don't care about anything other than increasing salaries regardless of anything else.

He does not look any bigger than in the Pitts days at least I don't think so. Look at the way Bonds ballooned up when his home run numbers went nuts. Joey Bats appears to be under quite a bit of scrutiny as well.

I think there are plenty of examples of guys retaining a goodly amount of their speed as long as they do not have serious leg injuries during their careers. Way fewer examples of guys having significant increases in power now that the Steroid Era is behind us.

God Damn.....Cook has really done a great job keeping the ball down but his mistakes don't seem to get missed. Thankfully he has made very very few of them.

I think folks talked about Crawford developing more power in response to comments that Crawford depends on his legs a good deal and it was hard to imagine him being able to depend on his legs as much on the back side of a seven year deal. Folks offered that he would develop more power as he aged which would replace his speed. I agree though. I don't see it working out that way either. If anything I think chances are better that Crawford will retain most of his speed than seeing him increase his power. May not matter in the long run. So far he has done well since returning.....thank God. Occasionally shows a sign of not being able to follow that low outside slider from LH pitchers.

I hate to say it but I don't think Lester or Beckett think about it at all. I don't even think they pay that much attention to a game they are not pitching.

How dare NESN mention Laffey's name. I am still hunting for a priest to do an exorcism.

Villanuava is up in the zone a bunch...hope we can continue to get runs off him

I actually think that while Garza does not really resolve the pitching problems that the Sox have, their interest in Garza is based on concern that the entire rotation is going to collapse. Frank and Felix cannot be expect to pitch big innings this year. The Sox are lucky they have done what they have done so far. Cook has turned out to be an interesting addition because he absolutely positively has to keep the ball down and so far he has. But right now you have a junk baller...Cook, a hard throwing LH pitcher that cannot pitch that many innings for you this season...Frank.....another young LH pitcher that looks like he will be a starting pitcher ether here or elsewhere....Felix, who is also going to be on limited innings, Buch, Beckett and Lester. I don't see any chance of those six guys getting the Sox through the season. If anything Beckett and Lester are already part way through a collapse and Felix and Frank have already pitched a fair number of innings. Buch who to me looks like the best of the bunch is kinda' fragile physically. So I think Garza is more about trying to avoid finishing the year again with a rotation that is a compete embarrassment.

LL's definition of a bold move will be whatever deal they put together to get Garza who will immediately be touted as the second coming of Cy Young as soon as that deal is made. I am more worried that the Sox will overpay and then some for Garza just to make the deal and make good on LL's "bold" pronouncements.

Sox starting pitching has been and is terrible but in truth all of the Sox many issues were on full display in Friday's Jays game, lousy starting pitching, lack of timely hitting, inability even to adapt to the opponent pitcher, the most rudimentary aspect of professional hitting and spotty defense. All of these issues have been evident at one time or another during this season, rarely all at the same time as they were in the Friday Jays game. As many have said from the start even before spring training, the 2012 edition of the Sox simply have to many holes to be taken seriously in any context. If they make the WC, they will be fortunate to win the play-in and if they win the play-in, I would not be surprised to see them bounced out by way of the broom in a short series. Imagine this team playing in the intensity of a post season series....if anything they will end up looking comical, ridiculous actually....their kind of offense likely falling flat on its face in the white heat of post season intensity and they will end up beaten by teams that either have better starting pitching (not hard this year) or actually do know how to hit behind runners, teams that play as teams and mount their offense as a team effort as opposed to the cumulative result of a bunch of individual efforts.

Geez I wish NESN would not interview somebody from the opponent when the opponent wins. Why don't they just interview a Red Sox player on a win and nobody when the other team wins. I don't know if they have had many team meetings lately but this team needs to find find some way to play together. It is getting to where I don't have a way to look at this rationally any more. I don't have a way to grapple with a "team" that plays so disjointedly. I don't want to just blame it all on the starting pitching always putting them in a hole but it is very very difficult to play always looking up because baseball is one of the few games where you do change how you play based on the score. To be honest it does not seem that they have ever played anything but disjointedly this year. So to me there is something deeper and more complex and problematic than just the starting pitching putting them in a hole.

Well this one goes to the top of my most frustrating games of 2012 list. Geez I am going to have to find a priest and have this one exorcized.

Great play by Ross in right. I never got past high school ball wyo ...that is how much of a no talent bum I was but it was a high school that was all about baseball....that was our deal so it was a very good high school baseball team and it was very competitive in that regard. If I had gone farther I would have been one of those guys that would have prompted you to say, just get two strikes on him and throw him a curveball...he will be dead meat carting his no talent ass back to the dugout. Crushed fastballs.... complete and utter meat to a curveball.

Oh my God you guys are not going to believe this but I was going to post that I was willing to bet that to add insult to injury the Jays will get at least one more insurance run in the 9th and I did not want to post it cause I feel like I am so critical and disgusted with this team.,,,,sure enough.....well the Sox are consistent...I will give them that.

Understood wyo. Probably the same for many. I just get so mad. I would have given anything to have had a tenth the talent that the worse player on this team has and to see it pissed away like this just churns my guts inside out.

Hell I was an amateur and I could not have looked myself in the mirror without throwing up playing a game this badly.

I would agree with you if this game was an anomaly wyo but it is not an anomaly. It is getting to the point where you almost don't have to watch the games anymore. The script is the same over and over again. They can bash out some wins but can't buy a single run when they really need a single run. Their starters dig a hole for them almost every game it seems. If I had decided to do it I could probably have recorded a DP that was missed or an error that was made every single game this year. They just give the opponent to many outs to play with. How I wish this game were an anomaly. I would give anything for that to be true.

Honest to God I almost just cannot take it anymore. I have no talent I had no talent but I swear on a stack of bibles I did not play that badly.

Geez Mike this is a guy I thought you would eat up. What a disappointment he has been tonight and you guys know I am not an Aviles fan but my God. Protect the plate for crying out loud.