jung

The broken bat hits were still on pitches up. I am sure he was not aiming to put those pitches where they were. So you can call it luck that they hit them or luck that he did not put those pitches in an even worse location.

Buch is really leaving to many pitches up in the zone tonight. Bound to have an off night sooner or later.

Oz looks real happy with that defensive gem

Man Buch is lucky that one is not rolling around in the outfield as well

Down in the zone Buch not up in the zone

Geez after so many good pitching performances we have the battle of the Middle of the Platers so far. Both are sort of serving up some of these pitches so far. Fortunately Buerhrle has been much more "giving",

Wow did Infante get down the line in a hurry.

Man I can not believe they keep giving Papi pitches below the belt line anywhere! He just crushes that stuff. I suppose it is hard for these guys to reverse their thinking from keep the ball down...keep the ball down to don't go down there!

Yea I almost posted on the location of some of the earlier pitches that were at least not up in the zone but were just about splitting the plate right down the middle.

Attack these guys Buch

I so wish that Pods had stayed healthy as we got Ross back so that it could have been Pods that stayed and d-mac on the DL or wherever. Pods is the only guy that they have had that has lead off the way a lead off hitter leads off and that seems to me to have provided a good jumping off spot for playing the kind of baseball the Sox have been forced to play lately. If Ross had come up for d-mac going the other way we would have gotten a RH bat for a RH bat and we would have gotten a deep threat for what is basically a no threat. Would have been pretty neat to still have Pods at the top of the order with Ross down there in HR territory from the right side.

So the Sox are at home with the DH and still stick AGons in RF so they can get Youk in the lineup!!! STUPID. I don't wish injury on any player but the Sox are so playing with fire here, in one of the toughest RF in baseball to play. You would think they would have looked at AGons having gotten pretty close to an injury recently playing out there and decided that enough was enough. But oh no....not the Red Sox. Lets just push this a bit farther. As if a base hit here or there is going to change anything regarding Youk's trade value. At this point the Sox will just have to go with....Youk needs a change of scenery. Youk is not going on some major run and anything less than that is just not going to change 0 for 18 and 4 for 34.

It should be clear by now that Ortiz can play 1st at least well enough in a pinch to back up AGons....or they bring somebody up again.

I have to admit that the way Pods pulled up it did look like less than a 15 day stint would leave him where he would be pulling up like that again. Maybe 15 days puts Pods back in shape again. I have said before that I think d-mac must be the luckiest guy on the planet cause he is always there when somebody else is getting hurt. Once Pods is ready again, presuming that there is not some other player ready for the DL, I wonder if d-mac finally has his stint on the DL.

Are you guys surprised that it was Pods that went to the DL to make room for Ross?

Maybe Youk is the kind of player that needs to get on the other side of all this trade talk so that he feels settled and wanted and can go out and play his best. It is hard for me to believe that Youk is completely shot. However I do think he might well be completely shot here.

With any luck an improvement in the SP (as in a move that gets them more starting pitching) will improve the Sox winning percentage and improvements in the winning percentage may be the best way to resolve some of these distractions and issues of discontent. However if their winning percentage improves but they still whine and moan and lose focus every time they have a bad outing individually, they may never work out of whatever funk they might be in. There is a parallel here between the players that are performing below expectations and the players that seem to be part of E1's malcontent list. The guys making the big money are the Red Sox players that are for the most part underperforming to expectation.

I suppose it is possible that it has suddenly occurred to these guys that they may not ever put having been part of the biggest collapse in baseball history behind them. That until that demon is expunged there maybe nothing they do individually or collectively that really matters. Will GM's be sitting there valuing and evaluating players when one of their minions pipes up with "well boss, he was part of the biggest collapse in baseball history". Who are these guys that almost seemed to will failure on themselves. Hell we lived it. Did it not get to be something that had the air of inevitability about it.....complete with nitwit Danny Boy pronouncing on the last night while the games were in progress that the Sox had escaped this most ignominious of fates. They basically took the most playing of players managers imaginable and stabbed him squarely in the back with it. They took all the rope he gave them, wrapped it around his AND their collective necks and kicked the stool out from under the whole miserable bunch of themselves. Is it a coincidence that every guy on E1's list was part of that mess? Maybe it isn't. Food for thought.

Ya' but Morales is not going to be more than another 5 at best. dice is not ready to be more than a 5 or a 4 and we don't know what the heck is going to happen with Beckett. I would have to say that betting on Morales is really very close to packing it in for the season which in reality may make a lotta' sense. I am really having a hard time seeing this team as anything more than one of the wild cards and in fact think they are more likely to be the 2nd WC if anything. While that might blow up somebody's dress...especially a somebody with a $50M budget, it does not do much for me. I might prefer to build my team and not trade the prospects that I think are valuable. An opposing argument might be that Ortiz is having a great year....Agons may finally come around and if we get back our injured guys, and Beckett is OK well maybe we are really one more good pitcher away from making a real run, maybe even a run at the division. I actually think they need Beckett to be OK and able to pitch the rest of the season AND we need another good SP. Maybe it is a good thing that they can see how Beckett is getting on as they make decisions about another arm. If Beckett is in more trouble than a 15 day DL can resolve, that might be it for the season anyway. I simply do not get why folks don't want to come to terms with pitching being at the heart of the matter. All of this focus on the injured everyday players is nothing more than an unwillingness in my view to acknowledge that it is all about the pitching and the Sox don't have enough. The interesting thing about this season is that the "good" ML teams sort of remind me of the good NFL teams the way pro football is played today. Take the starting QB off of any of these Super Bowl contending teams and they are done....finished....out of the running. Take enough starting pitching off of any of the contending WS series or don't give them enough from the start and they are done...finished....out of the running. So I suspect that even teams with more SP than the Sox have now, might just grab one of the guys that will be out on the market just because they add one more round to their gun and take one more round away from the competition. All by way of saying that if the Sox don't make a move for pitching, they will be deciding to take things as they come this year and planning on a serious run some other year. That might be fine. But we should understand that this is what we are talking about.

If they stay away from a guy like Dempster aren't they painting themselves into an impossible position? Tom Werner was on EEI today claiming that the Sox cannot and will not think in terms of a bridge season...blah blah blah. Not saying I believe anything these guys say anymore....However, if they are not active on a Dempster doesn't that force them to look at guys like Garza who will surely cost them more in prospects than Dempster will? I suppose the Sox could rely on Sox fans that think this team can make a legitimate run with the starting pitching that it has......but I am not sure how many Sox fans you could convince of that. On the other hand really dipping into a farm system for this team this year ala' a guy like Garza probably does not make much sense either. So in reneging on Dempster are we saying we need to get a Garza or are we saying that they can make a run without additional SP? Conversely are we saying that the Sox should stay with the current rotation because another SP just does not get the job done anyway?

Is it he injury now that he has some sort of strain I guess Chin Music or some other reason on Dempster?

Well this is clearly just my opinion but based on what he is doing I don't think for a minute that Beckett wants to be here. He told the media that he would hold a presser about this most recent DL stint and then skipped town on them. Many of us and most of the baseball media has said since before spring that the season would hinge on the health and performance of 1, 2 and 3 in the rotation. One of them going on the DL is without question a big deal. Even if Beckett just said, hey I am going to do everything I can do to get back on the field ASAP. I think I will be back after 15 days....he could have stopped with that or gone on if he wanted to but that much would have been fine. The ticket buying fans that love this team deserve that much anyway. Instead he tells the media he is going to hold a presser and skips town! He does not want to be here in my view. He does not give a rats ass about this team, his teammates, this town or its fans or even baseball for that matter. Need I remind us that he has already told us what his perspective is on baseball now. Frankly that is the one thing he could have avoided saying since it goes without saying that you family would come first. Only a dick-head that wants to shove it down your throat would feel compelled to say the words. I guy that does not want to be someplace will make life miserable for those around him until he is no longer in that place. How many examples of this do we have to see before we at least get this when it comes to professional athletes?

Hold up there big fella'. Saying that THIS is THE PROBLEM is probably putting to much weight on team chemistry, player discontent and its impact on play. Yea they look like they are distracted and lack focus. They even look whiny at times and I think it likely that it is an issue for them. I also will agree with you that the injuries are just a huge pile of excuse making if that is your point about the injuries. The teams they are competing with have monster injuries to contend with. For the most part the Sox injuries have been to everyday players and their offense has still been good enough to keep them 2nd in the league even while losing to many ballgames. So CC is not really a valid reason for their demise and while dice and Lackey are pitchers, they were lost to the Sox long before spring training. The Sox decided not to try to fill those holes. So, I really don't think you can point to their absence at least for this year. They need to bury the hatchet on this CRAP because any mistake made because of a lack of focus due to discontent or the sort of unhappiness the article is discussing is unacceptable and there are so many field lapses that the Sox are making at this point and a fair amount of open discontent that you can see as the camera pans the dugout and as we listen to the players in their interviews. It is hard to believe that one thing is not associated with the other. However that is not THE PROBLEM. They don't have enough starting pitching. That is the problem. If they really want to take a run at this thing this year, they need to solve that problem. If they don't in my view, they are not likely to make a legitimate run although I have reserved judgement until I see how June finally pans out. It is remarkable how many field lapses there are in a Sox game and that is why I suggested watching some other baseball just for the heck of it and just for comparison. However until and unless the Sox resolve their SP, everything else at least to me melts into the background. At least in my view if the Sox are on the outside looking in when all is said and done it won't be because somebody got picked off daydreaming on first base during a July 23rd night game. It will be because they never had enough starting pitching to begin with and don'e have enough now.

I was not sure at the end if the article was trying to make the case for trading Dempster to the Sox as a move that would help Theo more than it would help the Sox but if he can be had without raping the farm system Dempster may just be a great addition for the Sox who really do need help in the rotation. I know Dempster is not pitching in the AL East currently but neither are any of the other options the Sox would have and another SP would without question be the best kind of move the Sox could make as far as a trade is concerned. Garza might be as well but there will likely be so many teams looking for pitching that the price tag for Garza might just be to high.

Well for one thing, the body language from some of the pitchers is downright Lackey-esk and not just from Lester either. Many of the everyday players have looked distracted and half asleep at the plate and on the base paths. At least last night that seemed to leak into the fielding as well which was downright comical at times. It would not surprise me if at those times when they were just about to be picked off of first base or just about to swing at a slider a foot off the plate a look between their ears might reveal a big "I don't want to be here". And that is where the parallel between Reggie's Yankee team and this year's edition of the Sox breaks down. When that Yankee team took the field if anything it seemed that their anger and discontent fueled their focus. Near riots in the dugout turned into a roaring turbine engine on the diamond. This Sox team seems to go the other way in that regard. There seems no binding influence that can make it work for the Sox the way it worked for the Yanks of that era. Ortiz might have been that guy but he has likely lost a little credibility since lounging around the bases the other night and getting nailed in the process. Pedey really does not seem to lead that way and while his nipping at the ankles of his mates seems natural for him and is accepted by them, establishing a more traditional leadership footing seems just as unnatural for Pedey as the other stuff seems natural. When Agons tries it, it seems so transparent and strained that you almost chuckle. Hard to take him seriously and you are never sure when he is going to break out another of his "God does not want it to be that way" sort of comments. Maybe the guy that could do it is one of the guys currently on the shelf healing. I just don't know. However I will say that hearing about discontent being an issue and recognizing that since it manifests itself in field demeanor may also mean that it manifests itself in field performance is truly disturbing to me. I would normally not put much stock in this crap were it not for looking at their play which is often clearly distracted. Their lapses in judgement and focus comes in bunches and you would be kidding yourself if you think this much field malfeasance is just a matter of luck or the law of averages. I do think that as Sox fans we tend to lose track of what baseball elsewhere looks like. However without mentioning team names I would urge you to watch other baseball games....games where the Sox are not playing but where one of the teams they must get past is playing. Might give you a different perspective on where this team is going currently and how much needs to improve for the Sox to make a legitimate run. It won't leave you with a comfortable feeling but it might give you with a more balanced perspective.