FredLynn

OK guys, you fight this out yourselves. I am outta here.

We win no ring without some of the guys Duquette signed: Ramirez, Martinez, Varitek, Lowe...etc I am no Epstein fan, but we also win no ring without what he did that year either.

Just the facts about Duquette. No rings, but certainly steps forward for the franchise: Boston Red Sox Duquette became the GM of his hometown Red Sox and built a baseball operations department which has allowed the Red Sox to be the only team in MLB to set attendance and revenue records every year since 1998.[citation needed] The Red Sox went 656-574 in the 8 seasons under Duquette, setting attendance records every year after 1998 winning the AL East once and finishing 2nd behind the Yankees 5 other seasons. The Red Sox won the AL East pennant in 1995 before bowing to the Cleveland Guardians in the ALDS and made the playoffs as a Wild Card in 1998 and 1999, only to lose to the Cleveland Guardians again in the ALDS and the New York Yankees in the ALCS. Under Duquette, the Red Sox made exceptional strides in improving their dismal history of poor race relations as an organization in the hiring of both coaching and administrative personnel with minority candidates. The Minor League facilities and coaching availability were upgraded at every level during his tenure, and Red Sox favorites such as Nomar Garciaparra and Kevin Youkilis were drafted into the system. Other notable draftees in his Red Sox term were future MLB shortstops David Eckstein, Adam Everett and Hanley Ramirez as well as second baseman Freddy Sanchez. In 1996 Duquette signed Jamie Moyer to a free agent contract and then traded him to Seattle for outfielder Darren Bragg when manager Kevin Kennedy didn't pitch him much and Moyer expressed he didn't like playing in Boston. Despite being only 66-77 at the time of that trade, Moyer went on to win 139 games in just over 9 seasons with the Mariners and achieved over 250 wins in his career. Duquette is also famously known for his quote about Roger Clemens in which he said that "we had hoped to keep him in Boston during the twilight of his career" in 1996 after Clemens left as a free agent following a 39-40 record over his last four seasons pitching in Boston.[1] Clemens would go on to win the Cy Young Award and the pitching Triple Crown in both of the next two seasons. The free agency losses of Clemens and first baseman Mo Vaughn were major points of discontent amongst some Red Sox fans with regards to Duquette. He also did not resign Jose Canseco or Mike Greenwell. At present, Clemens remains under an indictment for lying to Congress that he used performance enhancing drugs (PED's) beginning in the period immediately following his departure from Boston to Toronto. Duquette is also noted for several major acquisitions that would ultimately play a part in the Red Sox 2004 World Championship, including acquiring knuckleballer Tim Wakefield in 1995, Pedro Mart?nez in 1997 from Montreal, the 1997 trade with Seattle for both pitcher Derek Lowe and All-Star catcher Jason Varitek the free agent signings of Manny Ram?rez in 2000 and Johnny Damon in December, 2001 and the Sox traded over 35 players in Duquette's farm system to staff the team including LHP Jorge De la Rosa traded for Curt Schilling. He was dismissed from his general manager post in 2002 when John W. Henry bought the team from the JRY Trust, headed by John Harrington.[2]

The 2004 ring had to be shared from a GM standpoint by both Duquette and Epstein. Both of those guys signed key pieces that got us a ring. Do you think we would have a ring without Manny the Mouth? Or Damon? Or Pedro? Or Lowe? Or Varitek? Duquette built the foundation; Epstein finished the job. IMO thinking either GM was solely or even mostly responsible for building that team is short sighted.

You have a lot to offer here. I learned something about fundamental baseball a couple of nights ago from you, and you have a lot of insightful things to post about the team. Not just gratuitous compliments, just my honest opinion. I think that personal stuff aside, you are one of the most astute posters here. That said, I would offer this constructive suggestion, for what its worth: you might be better off not telling people to "shut up" or "f*** off". Do with that what you will. Time to move on.

All you needed was the first line of your post. I am no big fan of Ellsbury, but he is no troll. You got a real anger problem.

I think he is a defensive liability out there. Its possible for the short term to spell Gonzalez, but not if there is an injury involved. Guess we really have no one on the roster who can take over. Not sure Lavarnway has enough experience there, but Gomez or Anderson could be called up.

Orioles lost too.

Yankmees lose. Lead down to 7

Good win. They all are nowadays. And yea, we can all get along here. Go Braves...up one, bottom of the ninth in NY.

TWO MORE GD OUTS!

I am not as comfortable as you are with our closer.

Not including tonite (BR doesn't have tonite's stats yet) he has hit .205/.518 over the last nine games. He remains hurt IMO and hopefully didn't do serious damage there. Thats a possibility too: making it even worse, requiring surgery. DL was the smart move.

No two injuries are the same. It would have been six weeks then we get a healthy player back. He hasn't been effective anyway since he got hurt.

Thats the way it will be all season for him. They never let him completely heal up. Its going to be a recurrent issue all year long. I still think it was a mistake not to DL him.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r266/kimonokat/smilies/toast.gif OOPS! Wrong kind of toast!

Everyone but Jacko that is.

Throw strikes Miller

Brennan, I gotta say, I enjoy stats even during games. Not everyone likes that. People like watching games in different ways. Its all good in my book-as long as it doesn't deteriorate into personal stuff.

Up to Shoppach. Kalish is showing that he is still a rookie.