WHERE'S WALLY?

Even more fun that I thought!

Since the re-signing of Mike Lowell sometime around Thanksgiving of 2007, I knew that the Red Sox would make the post-season in 2008. I didn't, however, think it'd be so damn hard. And never, did I imagine we'd be in second place to the Devil-less Rays. Oftentimes, I've felt this season was a disappointment -- the lack of run support for Beckett, the failure for Buchholz to adapt to the bigs, the struggles of the bullpen, Mike Timlin. The list could go on and on. It hasn't really felt like a season to celebrate. But now that I'm celebrating along with the rest of Red Sox Nation, I've realized what an achievement this season has really been. Yes, the Sox looked hard to beat going into spring training, but the current team is a completely different team than the one they started the season with -- no Manny, no Schilling, no Buchholz, no Lugo, no Drew, no Lowell. And many more spent time on the DL -- Big Papi, Josh Beckett, Sean Casey, David Aardsma, among others. With so many veteran's down and out, the young guys had to pick up the slack. With the pressure on, the young Sox put together amazing seasons-- Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, Jon Lester, Jed Lowrie, and Jacoby Ellsbury. And consider the phenomenal season of Mike Timlin, the perfectly timed comeback of Okajima's arm and Big Papi's bat. Yes, there is definitely reason to celebrate...

It's been a rollercoaster over the past couple of weeks. Just when I would get my hopes up that the Sox can win the division, they were quickly dashed (with runners left on). I've come to realize that the Sox can indeed win without Manny Ramirez, but I'm not sure they can win without both Mike Lowell and JD Drew. David Ortiz and Kevin Youkilis just simply don't come up often enough in the batting order to make that happen. Well, Mikey Lowell seemed to be feeling much better trotting around Fenway with his champagne bottles in hand. And JD Drew looked and felt good in batting practice. Whew. That teeny clip of Drew in BP was about as sweet an image as I'd seen in sometime and then I saw Big Papi with his party hat and goggles on. Good times.

Sox Songs

Thanks to Extra Bases for this lineup of songs (one for each starter in the lineup) by Desmond Reed that are very funny!

Ain't Karma A Bitch?

A long, long time ago, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays swept the Boston Red Sox at Tropicana Field. It was mid-season, but you wouldn't know it from the frenzy inside the often empty circus tent of a ballpark. Fans relished the win, waving brooms and ringing cowbells. Such celebrations are understood when major milestones are met -- when a team clinches a playoff berth, a division title, or wins a playoff series. But such celebrations midseason, during an ordinary series, are obnoxious and unsportsmanlike. But the icing on the cake in this one, was that the Rays' played "Sweet Caroline" after the final game of the sweep. They took it way too far. And with that bad karma, I was sure they had sealed their own fate. So I've been waiting and waiting and waiting for karma to come around and kick the Devil Rays in the ass. Finally, the day came...

After dropping 2 games to the flailing New York Yankees last weekend, the Rays pitching staff melted under the pressure when the Sox arrived at the Trop last night. The Sox hit more homeruns than I could count and made it clear that they are THE team to beat. In the end, the Sox finally moved into a tie for first place. Look, isn't that pretty??

Dave Grohl is really really funny

Thanks to Bill for pointing these out:

Dave Grohl and Will Ferrell duet:


Dave Grohl covers "Tiny Dancer":

Congratulations!

Congratulations to Don Orsillo, who not only got himself a nice, new contract, but announced his 1,000 game. Holy crap! That's a LOT of games.

Further congratulations to Dustin Pedroia who hit his 200th hit. Last week, Tim Wakefield threw his 500th game, but waited until he was home on Friday night to really celebrate with another 8 inning shutout. And congratulations to George Kottaras for scoring his first major league run, even though he struck out, and ran into a double play. Kottaras got to first on a 3rd strike that went to the back stop. Then Coco Crisp hit into an easy double play, but the ball was dropped as Kottaras arrived at the bag. Everyone was safe. Then George moved to third on a ground ball and scored on a pop fly.

Although that sounds a little crazy, it wasn't as crazy as the Sox defense at the time:

It looked a lot like a PawSox lineup, with a few exceptions, including Kevin Cash at third. YES, you read that right, Kevin Cash played third base. Luckily Devern Hansack felt mighty at home at Fenway, surrounding by all his PawSox boys and threw an outstanding 3 innings. Hansack managed to keep everyone from hitting down the third baseline, so we didn't really get to see Cash play third. It was probably for the best.

In case you missed it...

Comcast has the full video and of Papelbon, I mean, Cinco Ocho..

so good so good so good

September 9th

19 Games Remaining

AL East -0.5
AL Wildcard +7
Wildcard Magic # = 13

Bring It!

September 8th

20 Games Remaining

AL East -1.5
AL Wildcard +6.5
Wildcard Magic # = 14

September 2nd

25 games remaining

-5 AL East
+3 AL Wildcard

Wildcard Magic Number = 23

Games remaining vs TB = 6

September 1st

26 Games Left
-5.5 AL East
+2.5 AL Wildcard

BAL @ BOS
NYY @ TB
MIN @ TOR

King of the world

Nothing is better than watching Dustin Pedroia hitting in the clean-up spot. As if the guy doesn't play hard enough -- the pressure is really on to live up to his mouth when he's batting clean-up. So what does that little guy do -- he gets on base every single at bat and plays an extraordinary second base. He is phenomenal. The only thing that is more fun to watch is Terry Francona running out to argue a safe call on Pedoria's behalf. Here's the play

and Don and Jerry awarded Tito the "Twisted but True" award for the play:

Best Virgin Nominee

Big Papi was nominated for the Best Virgin Relly Award on Regis and Kelly. The Best Virgin Award goes to the best first time guest. You can vote for Papi until midnight tonight Vote often, because Papi's up against Brad Pitt! Good luck, Papi! Here's the clip from his award nominated performance:

Eck on Yankee Stadium

Booty-licious!

Coco Crisp wins gold medal in vault

video courtesy of MASN and MLB.tv

Life is like a box of chocolates abscessed anal sac

My dog has an infected anal sac. Yup, it's as nasty as it sounds. It pretty much sums up life these days. Nothing life threatening, but definitely not pretty. Sums up last night's game too. The Sox are supposed to be a favorite to win the World Series, yet they have their utility infielder in the bullpen... Not pretty, but it is kinda funny. It really had Jim Palmer perplexed. In later innings, when the Sox didn't use Cora, thanks to a surprisingly great outing by Hideki Okajimi, Palmer decided that Cora must have just been goofing around out there. I wish that were the case!

video courtesy of MASN and MLB.tv

Congratulations, Dice-K

Thanks to his five walk outing last night, Daisuke Matsuzaka now leads the American League in walks. Somehow, he's also fourth in wins...
has the lowest opponent batting average with runners in scoring position and....

hasn't given up a run in the 14 times that he's loaded the bases. That's really amazing. And really, really, REALLY stressful.

Dear Sean Casey,

First of all, let me just say that I'm a big fan. I think you bring a great energy to the Red Sox and have really helped out the Sox this season. I think you are hilarious and fun and I love watching you laugh and smile. You hit like Ichiro-- knocking in everything thrown at you for a bloop hit. However, you do not run like Ichiro. You run more like an elephant..... with his feet tied together... You make Mike Lowell look speedy. It's okay. You are awesome and you do not need to run. Let the rookie do the running. Accept the fact that you cannot run and be okay with that. Please please please stop trying to stretch out hits for an extra base. You will be called out. Every time. Even if you are safe, because it'll be impossible for the umpire to believe that you beat the throw. Yeah, you really do look that slow. Sorry... peace, love, and double-plays, lynne

An argument against vest jerseys

I've always hated vest jerseys, but then again baseball fashion is, well, not exactly fashionable. And it's not like the guys aren't wearing t-shirts under the vests. I'd really be worked up if the boys were bearing armpits. I just pretend that they are wearing different colored sleeves. But last night, poor Tommy Hunter proved that vests are not okay.

Oh the screen cap barely does it justice.... Hunter had a tight tee on under his vest. I think the tight sleeves are probably far more functional than the lose sleeves, especially for a pitcher. You don't want all sorts of extra fabric bunching up around your shoulder and tighter is definitely warmer. However tight shirt + vest = fashion disaster. It's worse than high socks. It's worse than stirrups! I think that Jason Bay is happy to be a Red Sox not because of the chance to be on winning team, but he's happy to escape the god-awful VEST!