jung

Well now at least we can stop worrying about getting the breaks. Rare to get a whole damn game gift wrapped courtesy of the umps but that is what we got today. Might turn out to be a nice to have if we can't do anything with Verlander tomorrow.

I hope they ask V what the hell Ace was doing in there in the ninth. V will probably come up with some terse...."question my judgement" answer.

I guess V thinks Ace needs the work. Mind-boggling

It is so hard to look at what Felix has done and have a complaint. Probably the key to getting a few more ground ball outs would be his use of the breaking ball to left hand hitters. Really everything he does to either side is designed to set guys up. If he is able to get a bit more snap on the breaking ball he should be able to get more left hand hitters to beat that thing into the ground. He does not have much snap on that pitch and it seems to me he is still a bit worried about hanging it. But that should be the pitch that would give him some quicker outs. He will likely always try to set up RH hitters for the K but I would love to see him be able to get more ground outs from the left hand hitters.

That is one of the downsides to setting guys up for K's all the time. Would be nice to see Felix get a few more ground outs. As it is, toss up 6-7 K's, a few full counts and there ya' are.

Geez has Fielder possibly gained weight? Somehow looks even bigger than at the start of the season.

Last thing this team needs is an extended Pedey stay on the the DL

To make the point VA if the score stays like this you can easily make the case that JH owes today's ump crew a set of headphones and a boat ride:D:D

Horrible call by the home plate ump and the crew chief VA. Aviles foul tipped strike 3 into the catchers mitt with two outs. The home plate ump was in the process of calling Aviles out and Aviles asked him to ask 1st base (crew chief) for help. 1st base said the ball hit the ground before hitting the mitt. Avlies stays up...then gets on...driving in a run in the process....and that is followed by a double. So instead of being back in the dugout, with no damage by the time it was all done, the Sox had scored multiple runs and Leyland went wild.

Never have believed in waste pitches. Felix is just mowing these guys down.....gets to 0-2 and then does not try to nip at the plate....just throws a complete waste pitch up there....then misses badly the other way for 2-2....suddenly gets to 3-2 and throws a meatball right down main street. Arghhhhhhhh!!!!!

Wow Felix is flowing so smooth and easy today...does not even look like he is working.

Geez I can't believe I did not notice this before...but these caps must be more of an MLB promotion as opposed to a Sox promotion. Just saw that the Tiger caps are the same way....looks just as bad on theirs I might add.....maybe worse!

Wow Fister has got nothing today...up in the zone to the right handers....right into the worst spots with nothing on it to left handers....I don't think we want the Tigers to go to their pen today.

Could not pull the trigger on a post in time. Salty is so on this guy.....Strike 1 would have been on Mars if it was a little farther inside. I think Salty knew he was right on this guy and was just going to hack at it until he got it.

Somebody mentioned earlier wanting to see Felix go farther into today's game. He has done just about everything you could ask of a 4 so far this year. If he does start going deeper into these games, now you are into 3 territory.

Regardless of the record, obviously no stopping that Sox marketing department turning out the merchandise....man I am not real hot on those caps though.

How wild would we be going if that had been a Tiger hitting instead of Aviles. More fun to think about....what would John Lackey be doing if he were on the mound.:rant::rant::rant: Seriously the Sox have gotten more breaks than that. They really do even out.....sometimes you do something with your breaks and sometimes you don't. That is all on them, one way or the other.

I do think it is time for us to acknowledge that the breaks even out in this game (Aviles).

Good timing on the comment about AGons running in slow mo because I think there is a trade off injury to mistake here. If you notice when AGons is in the outfield he runs like there are egg shells under his feet. As slow as he is on the base paths, he is that much slower in the outfield. If he continues to run that way I agree, there is little risk of injury. However the longer he stays out there running like that the more likely we are going to see a guy take a base not because of a throw but because Agons just did not get to the ball in time.

Honestly I think V is taking one hell of a risk putting AGons out there in RF in Fenway every day like this. He is still not hitting good enough in my view to add that much to the equation when you consider what he gives up out there and add the fact that he could easily injure himself out there. In this case we at least have Felix going...a left handed pitcher. I guess if V is going to do this in Fenway I would at the least prefer that he NOT do it any time the Sox have a RH pitcher going. So I am fine with this today other than that this makes three days in a row that V has had Agons out there. The more he is out there, the more the risk that he injures himself or just makes one hell of a mistake out there. That bloop HR from yesterday is not justification for having AGons out there. Just about any other park in baseball and we would have been using what would have been an out as part of the argument about his lack of power so far this year. I definitely would have expected not to see Agons out there regardless of who is going for the opposition now that Sweeney is back.

Well OK. You want to look at it that way. The worst we ever were was 7.5 out. So going 10-3 we picked up all of 2 games. Think you have the same issue just expressed differently. It is still damned difficult to make up ground in the AL East this year. We can look at the pack not being spread out in a positive light but that is simply a third way of expressing the same information a different way.

I think the point Brennan is trying to make is that the overall league and team dynamics have not changed. 1,2 and 3 in our rotation (far more important than 4 and 5) still goes out there and has a decent start surrounding it not by mediocre starts but by heaping turds. 4 and 5 do what is expected of a 4 and a 5 which means they are already digging into the pen. It is the failings of 1,2 and 3 that have not changed to any significant degree. Beckett is by far the most consistent of those three and to be honest I think he has fairly judged himself in that regard. He no longer believes baseball to be as important to him as it once was and the result is the occasional start where he simply is out there on the mound as an empty uniform. The most startling thing about that is that he is head and shoulders more consistent than Lester and Buch even given his current level of interest in baseball. As for the league as a whole, the issue is not even where teams like the Orioles will finish at this point. In general there are more mid-level teams this year than there has been for a long time....those that are based primarily on pitching will last longer and win more games than those that are not which is how and why we go 10-3 in 13 games and still are mired in the basement. The most important team dynamic bearing on the Sox is the Starting Pitching, most specifically 1,2 and 3. The most important league dynamic is the re-emergence of mid-level teams that will win more games generally and win more games from the Sox. Those two elements bearing on the Sox remain essentially unchanged from the start of the year to today. There are other things both positive and negative to talk about including things the Sox could do better that might have an impact but as for right now, those two elements remain as the biggest issues bearing on the Sox. If we are incredibly lucky we may end up bailed out by the league's second WC birth but that is about the only thing on the other side of the ledger. Interesting that the league waited till the season had already begun to finalize that decision.

Funny how MLB has to mask its rescue schemes for us and teams like the Yankees in these "keep the interest up everywhere" programs. MLB needs the big market teams in order to generate the big bucks and at the end of the day, it seems more than just a little interesting that the second WC comes along just as the Sox and Yanks are struggling to get in based on the old format. If there were only 1 WC team this year, there would already be just about nothing to talk about as far as post season is concerned for either Yankee fans or us. Seems to me that as far as participation across the league, the previous system was already working with teams like the Rays getting in and teams like the Angels looking like they could get in. It was only when it suddenly looked like teams like the Yankees and us might not get in that MLB responded.

The one thing we have ignored generally in the just wait till Ells and CC comments is that on balance the guys that have played have performed admirably either in replacement or have played better than expected when they joined the team. Nava has played way over his head and has contributed. Ross and Sweeney were both to figure into the original equation but have both contributed much more than we would have expected during this period without Ells and CC. I do expect Ross, Sweeney and Nava to all come back down to earth to some extent. The point is, I am not sure we are going to see that big a difference between the Sox with Ells and CC and without Ells and CC. CC for his part still has to have a good run of baseball in Boston...something he has yet to do. I do expect them to have an impact, particularly Ells. I just do not think it is going to be night and day once we take more realistic Ross/Sweeney numbers and combine them with Ells and CC numbers. However it appears to me that we are treating the difference like it is going to be night and day. That is going to be a tall order for a guy that has had a tough time proving himself at all here (CC) and a guy coming of a large joint injury (Ells). In addition none of those guys do anything for our pitching. On that front, dice and Cook are arms but they are not going to be like suddenly getting a 1 or a 2 back into your rotation. Bailey may be the biggest plus coming for the pitching.

I gotta' see more of this jerk now....thanks Buch