DocHolliday

I'd say the pitching is at worst 50% and at best 80% of the problem with this team over the past few seasons. This clearly has to be the number issue addressed in the offseason. But there are other ancillary issues that deserve adjustments as well.

Not all of us have the luxury of living our whole lives in the New England area. Blackouts are never really an issue except for the Rangers games and some of the FOX broadcasts in recent years. If MLB was smart, they would offer a premium out of market package to allow fans to override the regional blackouts for FOX Saturday games. It's clear from their MLB.tv package that there is enough demand from the majority of teams with fans who live or travel out of their team's regional broadcast area.

Rangers broadcasters "that ball wasn't hit on a line, it was coming down. It wasn't like it was crushed- but we might be a little biased saying that." Gee ya think? Can't stand it when I get blacked out on NESN during Rangers games.

Good call. Umps got it right.

There's a ledge there. Fan didn't reach over it from most angles I saw. It would have landed off the top of that ledge.

Against this Rangers offense, 4 runs over 6 2/3 is not bad- especially when you consider how well the Rangers have hit him recently. Dempster has been hittable tonight and they have done nothing with him. They did the same thing last Thursday against a no name from the Twins. Lester kept them in the game that night as well. Have to find a way to give run support when pitching steps up like this.

Like I said last night, the inconsistency of the offensive approach has to be discussed as a minor problem with the team's performance this year. This is th 2nd time this year they have faced Dempster and they have yet to score a run off him. Last night they were working the count and had an offensive approach against Yu. Tonight, they swing early in the account and expand the zone on junk pitches for easy outs. Say what you want about the pitching, but when the pitching has shown up, the offensive has been absent more times than not.

Tonight was one of the few nights on the season when no good deed went unpunished. Plenty of examples like the game a few weeks ago when Ortiz hurt his Achilles rounding the bases on the go ahead home run. Cheers to good fortune!

Atleast I can go to work tomorrow with a small ounce of pride. See how long that lasts...

Cruz still found a way to continue mashing against us, so this must be real. Work in progress...

Did Napoli just go 0-4 against us?

Even if they turn things around the rest of the season, they have their work cut out for them in the offseason. Tonight's approach at the plate should be their approach each and every night. The results my not always be there like tonight, but with the offensive talent, this will get them the 4-5 runs per game they need more times than not. So far, they have followed games like this up with long stretches of going through the motions at the plate. Pitching will have to make some serious adjustments for this team to go on any type of run.

I'm positive about next season too if the FO can: A) Move Atleast one of the Lackey/Beckett duo to change the arrogant culture among the starters. Going to have to eat some cash and will be tough to move Lackey coming off injury, but it has to be done. Even if the guy succeeds elsewhere, we can be certain the success would not come here and it's the price of getting out from under one of Theo's biggest blunders. Sincerely find a way to better condition and prepare the team for the season and during the season. It seems half of the injuries from the last 3 seasons are preventable, the other part of the game. Cutting down the preventable injuries and the siclical effect of the random injuries should keep the key players on the field. Preparation goes back to getting the players all on 1 agenda: doing what's best for the team to win games. Once that happens, the talent on the team will play on the field and show in the standings. C) Don't bank on the current pitching staff improving and add depth.

Salty aside, good approach from the Sox tonight.

See my earlier post about being patient with him and his similarities to Dice K.

Sadly, this is the type of outcry I've heard all year here in Dallas. While there are some knowledgeable Rangers fans, the vast majority would be considered "pink hats" by many on this board. With the Cowboys struggles in recent years, many sports fans in the area have jumped aboard. In the past, the Rangers were just a distraction until training camp begins.

Good approach from the offense tonight so far against Darvish. Hopefully the pitching will show up for once.

Things will get ugly if they drop this series. I hope the ownership group will be present for this series. They always seem to be there when the Yankees are in town. This Rangers team has been to the World Series for 2 straight years and is the class of the American League right now. They are a perfect example of what the Red Sox organization once was. Perhaps a beat down on the field and in the stands will tell them how the fans really feel about their recent performance and their indifferent perception with the product on the field.

You bring up good points here about how this organization should be concerned with the image of their players- which should play a strong factor in how their entire brand is viewed. They have shown many times how conscious they are of their brand image when they ought to be addressing the image of their players. In the past, all of these individual issues with the players didn't matter because the team consistently won on the field. I'm sure there were similar individual issues then that never made it to the public because the team was able to make things happen on the field. This is where Francona excelled in managing the personalities and agendas of all of these players. This current player group has proven for the better part of 2 years that they do not have the capacity to have all of these issues and still produce on the field. Its been well documented how they quit on Francona and how they never gave V a chance. The FO had 2 choices: bring in a new voice in hopes of changing the player views or get rid of the problem players themselves. Not only did they fail in fixing the clubhouse cancer, but they added to it by standing by said players and taking V's voice completely out of the equation. Not to mention the fact that they somehow believed that some of these players would completely change their philosophy.

They are going to have to score a lot more than 5 to have a reasonable chance of beating this Rangers squad that's about to come to town. A few years ago, I remember a game with the Rangers where the Red Sox had a 9-0 type of lead after the 1st inning. Then the rangers chipped away at the lead over the middle innings and even took the lead at one point in the later innings. The Red Sox ended up winning the game 15-14 or something close to that. Hard to believe that the Rangers pitching has come so far. They always had terrible pitching. Then 2 years ago everything fell into place with the pitching and they made it all the way to the world series.