Portland Sox Fan

I haven’t looked at the recaps, or the statistics, or anything. What a nightmare of a night. Pedro got spanked; Cubbage goes down (I guess he’s fine now), Ortiz finally hits the ball when it doesn’t matter.

What has gotten into Damon as of late? Another jack last night; and robbed of one later…maybe he is the strongest guy on the team??

Well, we are still going today. Looks like decent weather for mid-April anyway…here’s hoping Lowe has a good one…

EDIT: A poster over at SoSH made this observation:

Record after 11 games:

1998: 6-5
1986: 6-5
1975: 6-5
1967: 6-5

I watched the opening ceremonies yesterday; man, did it look miserable there. And man, did Lou Rawls suck.

Day/Night doubleheader today; could be a long day for the local 9. Don’t think rain is supposed to stop until 3 or 4, last I checked.

Apparantly Embree is hurt, and a young lefty will take his place for a while. Guess Matt White isn’t ready. And the home crowd audibly booed most of the bullpen. Not the classiest of moves, in my opinion. Pedro on the reaction:

”I expect [the fans] to be demanding and if you don’t do your job, I guess they’re going to boo you,” said Martinez. ”And this was a pure example of that.” But Martinez was quick to add, ”Wow, it’s kind of early, isn’t it?”

Edes claims that the Sox are thinking of using Person as the primary closer. Also in those notes; something I found flabbergasting:

A lot close to Fenway was charging – and getting – $60 for parking

Holy cow; I’m getting there early tomorrow and parking on the street!

Finally! The long road trip is over…I can’t comment much on the game, as I watched it out of the corner of my eye while playing cards last night. Althought I couldn’t believe when I looked up in the 7th and still saw a Sox starter in there.

Mike Timlin might become Mr. Quote for me this year:

Timlin overflows with optimism. He always looks at the bright side. His glass is never half empty.

“Just the energy that everybody was putting into that team, they lost. If they had completely thought the other way, they would have pulled it out.”

Part of me is really hoping for rainouts today and tomorrow so I end up with Opening Day tickets on Sunday. But the other part hopes the rain holds off today as I work at home and would like to watch. (If the Weather Channel is right, looks like they should get today’s in)

I read this morning about the whole Tim Robbins/Cooperstown thing. Jeff Jacobs Courant column (the print edition has copies of the letters sent from each party) is a good summary of it. Personally, I’m not a very political person. I don’t agree with Robbins’/Sarandon’s view on the war; but to politicize something as carefree and fun as the 15th anniversary of ‘Bull Durham’ is pretty stupid in my opinion.

For crying out loud; give me some feedback, people! The bulletin boards are dying!

…that I forgot to mention…

Since I haven’t seen it brought up anywhere else…

It was noted during the game chat last night; and later verified (after the GS) that Mendoza was given basically 2 minutes to warm up. Would a couple of visits to the mound have hurt?

Until the game is over.

Manny got his first dinger of the year.

Well, my mother always said if you didn’t have anything nice to say, then don’t…aww, crud, you get the idea.

That I don’t know what to think…

I’m not one to jump all over a baseball manager for his decisions; because I don’t pretend to know more than people whose whole career has been baseball. But I do think I know enough to have some valid questions (and start to see the point that some others have been making).

After last nights offensive (literally and figuratively) performance; a question that was brought up by another fan prior to the game was “Sunday’s lineup scored 12 runs; why change it?”. My initial reaction was that it isn’t that big of a deal…methinks I’m rethinking that opinion. Granted; the offense probably did enough at least for Lowe to leave with a win if he didn’t have such an off night; ultimately it wouldn’t have been enough to overcome yet another lovely bullpen performance…but why switch things around?

I guess Grady’s explanation (which I read after I started composing this) is that it is his ‘best defensive infield alingnment’. I suppose I can buy that for now; as you want good defense behind the sinkerballer. Just that last night they didn’t sink.

Oh, and as for Pedro…As you know, I’m happy then exercised his option; but after reading that article, I might be back to “Shut the hell up, Pedro” like I was when he first started demanding that the option be picked up. Read the article and see what I mean…

Unconfirmed by me; but according to this thread on SoSH, WEEI announced the Sox picked up Pedro’s 2004 option, and will work on a LT deal after the season. Nice.

Nice to smack around a pitcher who has given you trouble in the past like the Sox did yesterday. Young Master Hillenbrand continues to tear it up, and is currently on pace for 347 RBI.

Am I the only one that has noticed that Shea never shuts his mouth? That’s why I refer to him as ‘Cletus, the Slack-Jawed Yokel’. And I think it is great that he is tearing it up in the first week…and would love for that to continue. However, let us not forget torrid springs of years past.

And I hate to nitpick; but could somebody explain to me why you need to use 4 pitchers in a blowout like that? At least Grady seems pissed about the performance thus far; as he and Theo have some comments. Let’s hope it isn’t just empty words…

”We’ve got to show people some success and we’ve got to show it pretty soon because we’re not going to continue to repeat things that aren’t working around here,” he said. ”If something needs to change for us to be better, then there will be change.”

Asked if that could mean designating a regular closer, Little said, ”I’m not exactly sure what I’ll do, but I guarantee you one thing, Grady Little is not going to continue to do things that aren’t working.”

Nice to see Ricky Henderson’s influence still sticking around…

And for those whining about fat old Trot in the field; he made a great diving catch yesterday. Methinks reports of his balooning are a tad overblown. Now if he would only start hitting a little better. But it has only been a week; I suppose..

Found t

Did I already use that as a header? Well, it warrants using again.

Ugh.

Pedro has allowed 1 ER in 15 innings, and he is 0-0. Pathetic.

Before all the blame gets laid on Chad Fox (who definitely deserves some of it), let’s not forget that the Sox didn’t score any runs in the first 8 innings; and in the 9th, they had the bases juiced with 1 out.

My feelings:
1. Fine; rest Shea. He’s played every inning of every game. But since he and Millar are the two hot hands right now; why keep BOTH of them out of the lineup?
2. When you do PH with Millar (and Trot can just stay on the bench for a while, as far as I’m concerned), why do it when they are obviously going to walk him?
3. If you are going to walk the bases loaded; why leave Fox in there? Why not bring in someone who is more likely to throw a pitch that will induce the DP (Timlin? Mendoza?).

I just don’t get it….

Jeeezzz…talk about a first week of white-knucklers! Sox cruising to an easy victory, but the pen (specifically Mendoza) makes it a little close for comfort. Fantastic play to end the game; I just wish it wasn’t necessary….

Not sure I understand why Mendoza was even in there…

Well, no game on TV for me today; I get screwed by the Bruins yet again. It’s just me and the kid anyway, so I’ll be spending the day chasing her around.