jung

I really don't know what to think about the Bailey thing. I don't think it has anything to do with Bard because as enticing as it might be to throw him into a closer's role for a couple of weeks it is kinda' hard to have him working all ST and before toward starting and then turn him on a dime into the closer regardless of the limited work he will see as the 5 early on. Probably says something about how committed the Sox organization has been to trying Bard in the starter's role at least for some period of time in spite of what V might want. That might still be a possibility. I suspect they are going to have to move everybody who is in the pen up one notch which makes Melancon the closer for a period I would think.

I do think the injury, conditioning and medical team record of recent Sox memory has got folks just plain spooked about anything that has anything to do with the DL. Maybe that is why the Bailey concern might be a bit excessive at this point. But look at where Crawford is today and then make an argument that the concern some have expressed about Bailey is completely unjustified. Can't really say that this new crew of meds has seemed much better at least viewed from afar. Although we have been saying from the start that it is hard to expect a different clinical approach from doctors that are within the same medical association.

Well both right and wrong if you want to look at that way. The pen did do a very good job until they just plain got worn down to nothing. I would grant you that without the incredible work of Aceves the total stats might well have gone to hell or at least been worse. Have no idea how he survived it. I think if you want to take the glass half full approach, if that pen had not been worked to death, by all accounts it would have been very good. If you want to take the glass half empty approach, the numbers are the numbers and maybe they should have done better in the face of adversity. I happen to think that as a group they acquitted themselves well with Aceves really standing out.

Can somebody fill me in on the sequence of events? Some posts have sounded like V initially only announced Doubront as the 4. If that did in fact happen was it V that ultimately announced Bard as the 5 or did somebody from the FO make the Bard announcement? Then I heard on today's game telecast that Doubront announced himself as the 4 before V said anything about anybody. Maybe that is what happened with V announcing both Doubront and Bard at the same time.

Sorry my fault....I should have been more specific. I counted everybody in your top list of six as a starter figuring you were giving Miller some starts so he is in the 111 decisions. That list of six guys got 111 decisions and 67 of the 96 total wins. With Miller already accounted for I guess that means the pen simmed at 29-22 which does sound awful optimistic. On the one hand who gives a darn. On the other hand flip that to 22-29 and the Sox don't win the division and probably don't make the playoffs. Anyway it is a sim after all.

Where are the other pitching decisions coming from then? The starters in the sim are only accounting for 111 decisions out of 162 games and 67 of 96 wins. That makes the cast of pitching extras whether from the pen or elsewhere 29-22. That would seem a pretty optimistic outcome I would think. Oh well, it is a sim after all.

I will be interested to see how much regular season batting practice time V devotes to moving runners, bunting etc. While it helps to do these things in ST if it is the 130th game of the season and you have not even tried to lay down a bunt since ST, good luck getting one down at that point. The few occasions that the Sox tried to lay down a bunt last year were embarrassments. My God I can't remember which one it was because I think I closed eyes as soon as it happened but one of them almost got hit in the head trying to lay down a bunt and I don't mean because the pitch was high and tight!

Boy McDonald sure seems to have made progress. He is part of the reason why I think the Sox are improved in the supporting cast for 1-8. Hoping Spears gets the same sort of chance with the same sort of impact on his game at least at some point this season. On a more sobering note, Geez I hate the Rays pitching staff. They seem to have an abundance of pitchers with good location and great stuff. Hate them!!!!!!!!! That said, they are a good example for how important pitching is even in the contemporary game where we might be even more focused on hitting than we were in the past. I get the feeling though that the entirety of MLB is in denial with regard to the effect that the use of steroids had on offensive numbers for the period of time that they were to some extent allowed/ignored. I for one have little doubt that while pitching was always important, we will see teams with solid pitching and sound defense more successful than they were in the recent past. Brings backs memories for the amount of pub the so called "juiced" baseball got and the corked bat. I suspect that in retrospect, those were smoke screens intentional or not for what was really going on. Sure the number of pitchers we "think" were using steroids during that era is notable but it seemed to me that it had a different impact for pitchers, prolonging careers that should have ended because there velocity was going to drop off or their bodies were just breaking down. However there is just so much that muscle will do for a pitcher. I also think that the Saber fans have been left struggling with how to improve matrices that accurately reflect the importance of defense to run prevention. Should be fun to see the result of those efforts.

Hey in case anybody does not know today's game is being telecast on the MLB network.

The only problem with simming the season is that as usual the Sox have the best lineup 1-8 of anybody in the AL and as good a 1,2,3 taken as a group in the rotation. That has not been the Achilles Heel of the Sox these past few seasons. The Achilles Heel of this team is what happens when injuries and fatigue start to impact 1-8 and any part of 1,2,3 in the rotation as there is rarely much of import behind them. Nice touch holding Crawford out and only giving Buch 26 starts though. By the way, I am so tired of hearing media personalities and talk radio call-ins commenting that "Geez what is the problem with the FO? If Iggy just bats 245-250 with that glove we are golden." What a meaningless comment. Boy that would take some real guts wouldn't it? Iggy sporting a 245 average with that glove is a gutless no brainer. I want Iggy up and I don't need to see 245 to want him up. I suspect that the supporting cast is a bit improved this year as long as the staff can get through the first half without dice and as long as they smarten up and bring Iggy back once the infield starts coming up with the usual assortment of hamstrings and various and sundry other injuries. They look to have more outfield help this year than they had last year as well although defensively it is not much of an outfield, not with those arms. If Aviles subbed in the outfield he would immediately have the best outfield arm on the team by a mile.

Does anybody know if Bard got out of that last inning Jam without letting in runs or was it more that he got the final out of the inning while still having given up a couple of runs?

Schill may know something about what makes players go and not go. However there is no denying that Schill's opinion runs contrary to the public comments players have made. While there is the possibility the Schill is talking to players that have a different view from those of players that have commented publicly what purpose does Schill's comments have besides feathering his own nest by proclaiming his inside knowledge. Who does this help? We can't do anything about it one way or the other. So it does not help us a lick. To whatever extent this is about V this is about V as a man. V is not going to change based on some nebulous comments from Schill about what is and what is not working. The Sox hired V for who he is so V is going to toe his bosses line not Schill's and not the players. We castigated Tito for giving the players to much rope which they then used to hang him not more than a few months ago! I don't like some of the things that V has done and is doing mainly with regard to the way he comments in the press and to some smaller degree because of how totally focused he is on this year to the exclusion of everything else. However you could hardly blame him for the latter since the Sox only gave him a two year contract. But to say it is not working without benefit of seeing how this team performs on the field in the regular season is a bit much particularly since what we do have from players, like it or not is exactly the opposite. Even with that we will not be judging V to the exclusion of ownership, upper management, baseball operations and the players themselves. So if we have a reasonable expectation for what the team he has been given is capable of doing then we might ultimately be able to judge whether or not this is working whatever that even means at this point in March for God's sake. As for what he says in the press, he will either live or die by how the team performs and to a certain extent will be held accountable for what he says. One small example is the way V insisted on proclaiming his involvement in sending Iggy down. That sounded stupid and self serving. We know V wanted Iggy and to claim that he suddenly saw something he did not like when Iggy returned to the dugout was ridiculous. The FO wanted Iggy back down and that is where he went. But oh no....not V. He could not tolerate the notion that the press might think this was anybody else's idea or decision. In fact I believe when this is all said and done of the three items we have been watching with reference to the FO and V, I suspect the FO will win on all three counts. V has wanted Bard in the bullpen, Iggy and Larvanway up with the FO holding the opposite view. I suspect when this is done we will have Bard in the rotation and Iggy and Larvanway down. Since this is baseball I believe that is three strikes V.....your out.

I was listening to Dennis and Callahan this morning, something I rarely do because I believe them to be a pair of mind numbing bobble-headed idiots on an epic scale. The fact that they seem to think themselves worthy to offer us comment on a broad range of topics outside of sports makes it that much more likely that I call them to task. Sports is really entertainment but I still think Sports Media personalities have some responsibility to maintain certain standards. If media personalities think themselves worthy to venture into areas outside of sports and entertainment then I am really going to have my antenna up and hold them to a higher standard. Dennis and Callahan's defense of Schill was wrong headed in every possible way because it begins from the wrong premise. Schill is not a Sports Reporter which is the entire basis of the D&C defense of Schill. Schill is a Sports Journalist although from the D&C comments this morning I am no longer convinced that they or possibly even Schill know the difference. Sports Reporting is just what you might think. "Pedroia went 3 for 5 today" is reporting. When a media personality offers us his thoughts he is offering his opinion which resides within the domain of journalism. Following is Schills comments direct from the WEEI web site. The quotation marks are WEEI's not mine: Schilling said, "I like Bobby. I like him a lot," after working with Valentine at ESPN last season. However, Schilling said, "I thought that the manager that managed the Mets that I was not a big fan of was now going to be a different manager, and I don't think there's anything different at all. And I don't think that that is going to be conducive to doing well here. There's a lot of things I think that are happening not just from his perspective, but when you talk to these guys -- and I'm still talking to some of these guys -- I don't think this is going well. And I think it's going bad quicker than I expected it to." Schill offered us the benefit of what he is thinking no less than six times in that short piece, never offering one single bit of reporting in the process. In addition, Schill's only supporting argument for his opinion or opinions was a vague, nebulous reference to conversions with players that was offered without the inclusion of specific comment or context. When you offer your opinion and your only supporting argument happens to be vague and nebulous AND contrary to the comments that players are actually willing to attach their names to (see Beckett's comments on WEEI from Thursday) you have just leveled a cheap shot at your target. Schill "cheap shot" V in the truest sense of the use of the term. The only other thing Schill offered us would appear to be an outright lie as offering that sort of cheap shot would not seem the thing you would do to somebody that you "like" referring in this case to Schill claiming to like V. I am willing in a sense to excuse Schill as this is simply not a job that he is equipped to do and either somebody should polish him, edit him, do something for him or get him off the air before he embarrasses himself in a way that is not recoverable. However Dennis and Callahan are supposed to be seasoned, skilled, professional media personalities and their ham handed, mind numbing defense of Schill should be condemned for what it is, arrogance and idiocy combined in a cocktail from knucklehead-ville. I simply do not know what to think anymore about what passes for media comment that is fit for public consumption in a city that is one of the world's respected educational centers. While I consider Schills comments bad and in poor form, even juvenile, I consider the D&C defense of Schill to be either ignorant in the extreme or so lacking in social conscience and respect for their audience that I can only describe it as reprehensible. These two palooka's should have been bounced off the airwaves long ago making way for somebody that actually has something to say that is worth listening to. Granted this is Sports Media, not a mecca of reporting or journalistic excellence to begin with. Nobody on sports radio is likely to ever be competing for a Pulitzer. However when media personalities treat their audience with that much disrespect, that is where I draw a line. If they can't do better than this, do something else for God's sake.

To be honest iortiz although nobody is going to admit it, I think Bard would have had to have fallen completely off the apply cart to not get at least the 5 spot. The FO has wanted him in the rotation and I suspect that is what they are going to get. It just so happens that I also think that is the right thing to do, with Doubront as the 4. Now if the FO had pushed Bard into the 4 hole, based on his performance so far this spring I would have been squakin'. But I think putting him in the 5 and sending Aceves back to the pen is as close to getting it right as I would have hoped for. As far as Miller goes, I like Miller probably even more than most but Bard has more upside than both Miller and Aceves as a starter and this is the time to vet that possibility. Things could not be falling into place better in that regard. You have Bard in the 5 which will limit the number of starts and total innings to begin with and dice hopefully staying on track to come back at least by July and maybe sooner if the Sox get real lucky. I think what they will look for from Bard on Friday is fewer walks and most specifically fewer walks with nobody out in an inning. He was OK for the most part his last outing until the 6th inning when he hit the first batter and walked the second. The other thing I think they will look for is more of the mental attitude of the starter. In that same 6th inning in his last outing Bard obviously got himself into a late jam having allowed the first two guys in the inning on base. He had one out with one run in that inning when a left handed hitter stepped to the plate. Bard got ahead with a 1-2 count but then just grooved a pitch with a man on third. I mean that thing was belt high, right down the middle. The hitter bounced one to the right side of the plate which was an auto-run scored which also tied the game, whipping out the Sox one run lead. The Sox had come into that inning up by two runs. Regardless of what sort of jams he got into during that outing I would have been much more impressed had he left that 6th inning having limited the damage to one run and having preserved the Sox lead as he exited the game. That is the sort of situational pitching that is expected of a starter and makes a big impression on me as far as starting pitchers are concerned. So I think they will let him try to pitch out of jams that he gets into in an effort to see if he is growing even here in the spring in his understanding of situational pitching as a starter. We have all watched this process of selecting a 4 and 5 with a great deal of interest this spring. I hope watching the various candidates pitch has also given us more of an understanding for the challenges of starting in the ML. To be honest I have enjoyed this immensely. We have been able to watch some guys that have the mentality of the starter but very likely lack the stuff to survive in the AL East. Maybe Cook comes to mind here. We have been able to watch guys like Doubront who has been able to hone his skills as a starter in the minors and now for the most part has the presence of a starter with better stuff than a Cook for example. At the other end of the spectrum we have gotten to watch Bard with tremendous potential and great stuff while still adapting to a role that requires the ability to situational pitch, batter after batter, inning after inning.

You know what....there are times when it just takes me to long to do simply arithmetic like add 2+2. I had contended in a recent post that it did not matter what Madden had to say about CC's wrist because in my view the Sox likely knew about it before signing him anyway. If the later part of last season was the first the Sox knew about the wrist, do you think they would have just let him go home without doing an MRI? How much do you want to bet that until somebody speaks up, the fact that they just lest him go home might be the best evidence we have that they knew about the wrist before signing him. Why do an MRI? "This is just CC's wrist acting up and we already know about that" might have been the train of thought!

Well I was hoping for May on CC but if in fact you are right and it is going to be June......oh my God, I don't even want to think about how ugly things will get around here if he then gets off to a slow start at that point. Geez sbf, did you see something in print taking about June for CC? Now how does just letting him go home at the end of last season taste to us faithful?

The offering of an opinion without substance to support it and in fact contrary to the evidence that does exist is the very definition of a cheap shot. Hence I would surmise that V has nothing on Schill in that regard but would instead offer that they are birds of a feather.

Sure it is Schill's job for the most part to stir the pot. Although that was not previously so tempting a target for sports journalists it seems to be the target of preference for some of the sports journalist, especially those that are ex-athletes. I have no problem with Schill having an opinion. As I stated earlier, if his opinion is not good enough to be voiced without drawing these obtuse, nebulous and ham handed references to player comments of unknown content or context then his opinion is not good enough as in not worthy of public consumption. His comments were all breathless pantings, a teenager fumbling around looking for the hook on the bra. Either somebody needs to polish him up before turning him loose or he needs to find another line of work.

As I am sure you know, I am very much in agreement with you UN.

I agree that the price for CC was way wrong as was the term of the contract. The likelihood that they may well have tossed all that money at CC in spite of the wrist just adds fuel to the fire. I will never understand this deal for as long as I live wrist or no wrist. It was more senseless than Lackey by a mile. Now as many have suggested, CC will NOT be back even early in the regular season. He is on his way to a minor league rehab stint and he is not even ready for that yet. So it is going to be year 3 at best of a 7 year deal before we will likely see a full season of CC at anything like even the numbers he produced in Tampa as you have to think CC is going to miss at least the first month of this season. Cashmen probably wakes up laughing his ass off every morning. Amazing how one really bad move can set the tone for a franchise for years. As bad as some of the other Sox big dollar signings have been they do not come close to having the downstream impact of the Crawford signing. For example, there is still every chance in my view that ownership will not open up the purse strings to sign Ellsbury for what it will take just to tie down two outfield positions at better than $21M each. Lets face it CC has only set the market for the Sox. His contract has not set the market for any other team, another indication of how bad the CC deal is in fact. So now at least in my view, only the Sox will be required to better CC's deal in order to keep Ellsbury in Boston. Outstanding......Theo should have stopped whining about needing State Troopers at the end of his street and just been happy that there was not a lynch mob after him. That said I really still think there are larger issues with the Sox organization including an owner that did nothing to stop this deal when he could have and then could not keep his mouth shut about not liking the deal from the start.

As far as CC's wrist is concerned, based on how it has been explained, it does not matter that Madden says the Rays knew about CC's wrist. I think it unlikely that the Sox did not know about CC's wrist. As it turns out the guy has been treated for it by one means or another for what....most of his ML career. You really think the Sox had no idea that there was some issue there? It is entirely possible that they did not know to what degree but it is not like baseball clubhouses are run by CIA operatives. I suspect the Sox knew there was something there and are not disposed to tell us that at this point. What good does it do them? So the Madden story gives the media another 1,000 words or so of print copy but I don't think it means anything cause I suspect the Sox knew there was something there and chose to ignore it or at the very least not consider it an issue.

I agree VA. I have been satisfied that with the options available to the Sox, Doubront has done the job and earned the 4 spot. Bard is a 5 to me especially when you consider the number of innings he will save at the 5 and the fact that dice is probably going to make it back at some point this year unless something goes really wrong. In fact I think this is working out pretty good for the Sox if it goes this way. The Sox get to fully vet Bard as a starter and that could turn out to be a big deal for this organization. By the time dice comes back, the Sox will be able to choose what to do at that point. I am not happy with Iggy going down but given the available options if Doubront 4 and Bard 5 is the result and either Iggy comes back or Aviles plays well enough to keep him down on the farm (way less likely) then let the season begin and lets see what we really have. I think the real issue for the Sox and not having Iggy is that Youk is fading defensively at 3rd and Youk and Aviles is a pretty weak left side defensively. Iggy would be enormously helpful to a team that on the face of it is not very good defensively and a team that could be exposed defensively as it was last year if the pitching does not excel. Don't get me wrong. There are other issues that this team has and it still really bowls down to 1,2, 3 in the rotation. All I am saying is that based on the guys they went into ST with, with the exception of Iggy going down, with Doubront at the 4 and Bard at the 5 and Aceves back to the pen, I think they are doing what they can do with this grouping of personnel.

Well I was surprised to hear Cafardo's comments on Iggy today mainly because he was so much in agreement with things that many of us have been saying for weeks. I think Cafardo actually knows what he is talking about whereas I am often just shooting my mouth off based on what I am seeing or at least think I am seeing. At any rate Cafardo is mystified with the Sox and their historical inability to come to terms with SS as a plus defensive position. This is something that I have talked about for weeks now so I won't belabor the point more than I have. The key point is that this is going to be a pitching staff desperately looking for help in the field this year. When said pitching staff found to many bats with to many balls last year there was little to no help from the defense behind them and things went from bad to worse as to many struck baseballs were either booted in the field or were picked up but thrown poorly or to the wrong base. All kinds of s*** happened to that defense once bats started finding balls later in the season. Now Youk is one year older and his range has continued in decline in recent years. I expect his range to be marginally worse this year than it was last and I don't expect him to play more than 120 games either. Aviles will have to pick up the remaining games at third which brings Punto in to play SS. There is a plus bat for you. On the subject of batting and Iggy (and here is where Cafardo being there all spring and knowing what he is doing helps) Cafardo comments that Iggy has only struck out 3 times in 25 at bats so in Cafardo's view it is not like the kid is embarrassing himself out there. His view is that Iggy is holding his own at the plate given where he has been and is such a plus defender that he should be the Sox starting SS. I agree and hope that we see Iggy back sooner rather than later.

Players may well be talking to Schill. I don't think anybody has an issue with Schills relationship with players. I am not sure folks are thrilled with Schill then offering the opinion that things are going South "faster than he expected". What the hell does that even mean. All that matters is how the team performs on the field during the season. We went through I don't know how much time determining that while chicken and bear might have become the symbol of a team gone awry, had that team performed on the field nobody would have cared. I don't llke the way V rationalizes doing what he wants to do. That whole business of "I don't criticize, I just tell the truth" was utter nonsense and a pure rationalization of a behavior that V is never going to change cause he does not want to change. So he chooses to rationalize even if his rationalization makes no sense. So I can see why V is a target for Schill and a number of others for that matter. However, all Schill did was create even more focus and intensity from the media in its hunt for ghosts and goblins. Players are just going to continue to be subjected to endless questions that are really an effort by other media hounds to draw out some elaboration of the Schill comment. This team needs more of that like it needs a hole in the head. What we have here is Schills opinion and an effort by Schill to lend some credibility to it by mentioning comments of unspecified content and context from unnamed players. I would have preferred that Schill just offer his opinion. If it is not good enough to leave such a nebulous and provocative reference to the players out of it then it's not good enough. In my view Schill should find another line of work because he is not good at this one. We are probably all lucky that his stab at national politics went nowhere.

Schill was great as a ballplayer. No denying his contribution to the Red Sox. In this role he is just.....well....wierd. Every time I listen to him I start feeling like the earth has tilted oddly on its axis. I actually think that for his own good, if that whole video game thing does take off, he might be best served devoting all of his energies to that. We have tended to cut Schill a break here but he won't get said break in the national spotlight. I am afraid that Schill is going to stick his foot way down his throat in a way that won't allow him to remove it, Jimmy the Greek style. Not that Schill would get in trouble over the same topic as the Greek but I think he is well capable of screwing up just as badly. I would prefer Schill be remembered standing on the mound with that bloody sock.