Hey, Look at That! Sox Are 2 Games Back (Oh, And Manny's Back)

We're midway through June in the year of our Lord 2010 and the Boston Redsox are 2 games behind the 2 best teams in baseball. By winning percentage as of today (.588), the team that plays in Fenway is the third best team in all of baseball. Woo hoo! Give us a bronze medal!

We got plenty of problems with the pitching staff and injuries, but I guess there is one interesting thing to say about how this team has been resiliently playing: Thank you, all-knowing, all-giving Jah, for interleague play! The Sox have been beating the crap out of teams like the Phillies and Diamondbacks with a strange combination of a banged up outfield, some grit and toughness from the bullpen, and a lineup that never gives up. Things are oddly clicking, and it's got to have Yankee and Rays fans sweating in their Underoos.

Seems like every other day someone is landing on the DL or getting a coritsone shot or having a hurt back and neck... So to be the third best team in all of baseball must feel really freaking good considering.

I'm mightily impressed by the bounce back and mental toughness of Lester, Buchholz, Scutaro, Beltre, Martinez and Ortiz. These 6 guys have been doing a tremendous job of being good when it matters. There have been many contributions, so not entirely fair to single them out, but for different reasons, these 6 gentleman stick out to me.

Lester is dominating. Buchholz is giving the team a chance to win just about every outing. Scutaro is getting on base consistently and scoring. Beltre is hitting the cover off the ball (and incidentally is the second hardest swinger I have ever seen next to Gary Sheffield). Martinez is a patient, methodical hitter who is not afraid to put pressure on the defense by getting on base and taking walks. And Ortiz is back to Big Papi status knocking balls to the deepest part of Fenway for home runs, but also going opposite field and hitting singles and doubles with regularity.

I shouldn't be gushing in mid-June, but I can't help it. A month ago we thought there was no chance in Hades this team was playoff bound, but with solid, consistent play, this team is showing it deserves a real shot.

Two things to note: First, Manny is back in Fenway, and while he will be booed in his at bats, I think he deserves to be applauded for the championships he was part of for Boston. Yeh, he's a flakey-bakey nutjob (and the way he left was downright retahded), but he's also one of the greatest and feared hitters ever to play the game.

Secondly, the Sox have called up triple-A prospect Felix Doubront for a start against the Dodgers tonight. This lefty has been pitching really well for Pawtucket , so I'm excited to see what he can do against the likes of Manny, Kemp, Ethier and the rest of a decent swinging, first-place NL team. Doubront moved from Portland to Pawtucket this year and in 12 starts for both teams is 6-1 with a combined ERA of 2.11.

[Image by Eric Kilby via Flickr cc 3.0]

Love for Manny Fading in LA?

Funny post over at Vin Scully Is My Homeboy--a solid Dodgers fan blog--about how Manny went back to L.A. to treat his strained calf while his team was playing the Nationals in Washington.

Evidently, Manny was so bored being at home--while his team played an extra innings game in D.C.-- he needed to do some shopping at a BestBuy in Pasadena (which one commenter claimed was to buy The Sopranos dvds).

The woman who snapped this pic now finds Manny despicable. KellyKelll wrote on her TwitPic:

Official manny hatter!!! Uhhhh dodgers are in extra innings and he is "hurt" shopping at my store. Uhhh

In defense of most of the other Dodger fans commenting on the site, they generally don't see the big deal as long as he gets his treatments. Most Red Sox fans would have been sending him death threats and calling for his trade (until the playoffs when we loved him).

I still miss his swing and Yankee killing.

At least he wasn't spotted at one of the many medical marijuana spots in Cali. He must send someone out to fetch for those treatments.

Ode to the Worst Week in Red Sox Baseball in a Long Time

So many Red Sox thoughts right now, I'm overwhelmed with strange feelings.

It started with Lester's 8 innings in Tampa last week when it looked like it was a lock for a win. And then the pen collapsed. I knew then that there was something strange and eerie going on--like it was 2008 all over again and the Rays have magical powers at the Trop.

Some thoughts go to the past... Was Manny a Zenmaster in disguise, relaxing the middle of the lineup with his que-sera-sera, stoner outlook?

I despise Manny now for what he did to get traded, but I understand his value in the middle of that lineup. For all his bad traits, the guy rarely pressed. He was the equivalent of having, gulp, Mark Teixiera (say what you want about him being on the Yankees--the guy is a freaking stud).

Manny relaxed Ortiz. This is not news, it's just a fact. As Eric said to me today, "Manny is a lingering presence. Like overripe fish."

Is the silver lining that our starting pitching is very good? Is Tito for real doing these Bigelow Green Tea ads online?

Whatever the case, I haven't seen the Red Sox offense press so much in a very long time.

Youkilis who had been hitting really well on the road, suddenly lost it again over the weekend. The Jason Bay hamstring pull couldn't have come at a worse time. I love getting V-Mart, but getting him in a slump of sorts is unfortunate.

Lester and Beckett are studs. Buchholz has some things to work out, namely, throwing that fastball for strikes (and maybe going back to the mysteriously missing curveball).

First place is pretty much a goner at this point in the season, unless the Yankees pull an about face or there is some major injury to Burnett or Carston Charles. The wild card is the spot to get, and with having to go on the road in Texas and Toronto, the Sox have a lot more work to do.

The point is that it's time to relax a little, and get back to basics. Shrug off the week, and get back to taking bad pitches, hitting strikes and being patient.

ps. The Red Sox schedule is so whacked this week.. Why the hell do they go home for 4 games, then are back on the road for 6 to Texas (again) and Toronto? And looking ahead, from August 18 to 30 the Red Sox do not have one day off.

Manny Ortez and the Revelations of the List

I'm not particularly in the mood to think about the consequences of this article, but one thing my suddenly flailing mind latched on to was about the mention of ongoing battle over the rights to the list:

The union has argued that the government illegally seized the 2003 test results, and judges at various levels of the federal court system have weighed whether the government can keep them. The government hopes to question every player on the list to determine where the drugs came from. An appeals court is deliberating the matter, and the losing side is likely to appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

Assume for a moment that the Supreme Court accepts the case. Now that Sotomayor's ascension to the country's highest court seems certain, she'll likely be on the bench when the case comes into the docket, giving her the opportunity to play a deciding role in baseball's two biggest legal battles in the last thirty years. I have no idea what sort of decision she'll make on the case - I just think the coincidence is pretty neat.

And yes, I'm looking for any distractions I can find. I'd like to keep from becoming completely cynical about baseball if at all possible.

Manny and the PEDs

Besides the "holy crap!" nature of the story - I mean, Manny Ramirez getting suspended for half a season just makes you wonder that much more about everything that happened while he was in Boston - one thing I note with sardonic amusement: Jose Canseco was right again.

In an appearance at USC last month, Jose Canseco said Ramirez's name "is most likely, 90%" on a list of 104 players that failed a drug test in 2003. The players were promised anonymity for taking tests in 2003; Rodriguez is the only player that has been identified among that group.

What's Canseco's record on these things at this point? At least 90 percent, with a few unconfirmed? And yet no one (yours truly included) really wants to listen to him every time he makes a claim about someone who juiced. Does that make him the slightly scummy Jeremiah of 'Roid Years?

No Sheffs In This Kitchen, Thank You

Good to see the numbers and the man agree: Ortiz needs no Manny protection to thrive.

Meanwhile, ProJo reports on the possibility of Gary Sheffield coming to Boston after a failed stint in Detroit. It seems to be a one-sided desire so far, but let's review why it would be a bad idea:

• He's a 40-year-old power hitter. They don't tend to age very well, particularly without the aid of third-party substances.
• He's coming off a season where he spent a good month on the DL and he has a history of wrist problems.
• He doesn't play well with others. I was looking forward to a season where someone didn't spend time at the front of the sports pages for saying something incredibly idiotic. He's also a bit of a tool.
  
• I just might have to bring back Weird Mitigating Factors.
  

No Manny? No Problem!

For all afraid of Papi's lack of protection from Manny in 2009, look no further than Paul SF's breakdown of the big man's numbers when he went Ramirez-less in the lineup. Looks like - assuming we've got a health Ortiz returning to form - that we'll have plenty to cheer about from the heart of the order.

Bring Back Manny?

So Charles P. Pierce has an idea: bring back Manny. He's not kidding, either: let bygones be bygones and get a bargain price for a fantastic hitter who's demonstrated he's got plenty of gas left in the tank, filling a potential lineup hole in the process. While the Sox are at it, they can use a Manny signing to offload Jason Bay while he still has value and acquire...well, I don't really know at this point, since Boston is swimming in replacement-level pitching arms, but something.

Madness, you say. Pure idiocy, you say. Turn in your writing license, says irate commenter GEO, who - ironically enough - spends most of his post violating what I do not doubt would be the terms of a "writing license" with his all-caps assault and atrocious grammar. I was all aboard for Mr. Pierce's head, too, until I realized that his statements have a larger context: his post is a poster child (you like what I did there?) for the war between stats types and trad types.

To review, the modus operandi of a pure stat-head is that anything that cannot measured - things like chemistry, drive, fortitude, and all of the other stuff that Fire Joe Morgan lovingly lumped under the term "intangibles" - is irrelevant to the argument of relative value. Pure trad types, on the other hand, pooh-pooh the idea of using what they see as increasingly obscure measurements that cloud the spontaneous aspects of the game, preferring to give equal credence to a player's leadership abilities as they do to his ability to get hits. Pierce's prose suggests that he sides with the former camp in his views:

Cruising the sports pages the other day, I noticed that there is a free agent out there who’s hitting .314 lifetime with 527 home runs and who, last year, almost singlehandedly lifted a mediocre bunch of Los Angeles Dodgers into the playoffs. He hit 17 home runs down the stretch and knocked in 53 runs in as many games. And, almost unbelievably, he’s on the market. Right now.

In other words: screw the circumstances of Manny's departure; he can do the one thing that teams pay baseball players to do, and he can still do it far better than the average player. Indeed, it sounds like we can take things one step further: to focus on Manny's attitude and his performance off the field (or maybe just away from the plate?) is to blind one's self to the truth that baseball players are all replaceable parts of greater or lesser quality. The Sox can use Manny to construct a winning team...and so they should.

Forthcoming Uncontrollable Laughter

I believe the news in this article is a good demonstration of the powers of bad juju on the boomerang return. Poor Manny, getting his comeuppance for chasing the benjamins. I guess there really is a point where a team won't take a rider on a good product with a really piss-poor reputation, huh?

Manny and the Baseball Industrial Complex

Some friends and I were watching JFK last night, getting beaten over the head with the movie's theories-as-facts presentation and its insistent theme that the military-industrial complex killed America's White Knight president because he wouldn't play their financial game. I don't have this blog to discuss politics - historical or otherwise - so I won't get into my thoughts on the subject, but I bring up this particular selection from Oliver Stone's cinematographic resume because of the headline I spotted on RedSox.com after we finished watching the movie: "Sox made move to suspend Manny."

In the piece, we're told that - as cited in an ESPN report - the Sox delivered a letter to Manny (with copies to MLB, the MLB PA, and Scott Boras) on Friday, July 25, telling him he would be suspended without pay for refusing to play starting the following day. Two hours later, Ramirez called the team and told officials he would play. Six days later, Boston sent Manny packing to Los Angeles.

I'm not particularly interested in analyzing the ins and outs of the circumstances leading up to the trade any further, but what really struck me about this announcement was the timing: its similarity to the Machievellian tactics used by the hidden Them in JFK to discredit the main characters. Why else would the Sox leak this information now, if not to sabotage Manny's contract negotiations in a "you hurt us so we'll hurt you" ploy of power? I'm not saying that what Ramirez did at the end of July was right, or that he should be rewarded with a fat contract, but this move seems like stooping to his level. Frankly, I'm a little disgusted.

Filling the Slugging Gap

David Ortiz misses Manny. Or Manny's bat, anyway. Sort of. He won't come right out and say it, because he's far too polite, but he's happy to hint about it obliquely. It's pretty clear that he - like Bill Lee - believes the only thing standing between Boston and another ring this year was Manny's ability to hit the long ball. They both might have a point: do a straight-up substitution of Manny for Bay in the ALCS and the difference is, quite frankly, embarrassing. We all deluded ourselves into thinking we wouldn't miss Manny because we had Bay, but those numbers give that delusion the lie: Bay, while good, is no replacement for Manny's greatness.

In an effort to lessen that gap, Ortiz wants the Sox to sign Teixeira. Pursuing the ex-Angels first baseman comes with a few logistical problems - does Boston have the desire to spend the money, what would happen to Mike Lowell - but first, is Teixeira (or any other big bat) an acquisition the Sox need to make? Teixeira has certainly been a more consistently successful hitter than Lowell, with an OPS+ that hasn't fallen below 126 since his first year. He's also much more of a power hitter, fitting Ortiz's desire for protective, Manny-style bat, while Lowell's isolated power numbers, even with all of those doubles, have never returned to their Marlins-era peak. But Teixeira isn't Manny: as an example, until this year, Teixeira never had really stellar plate discipline, and his K/BB ratio only climbed after coming to the Angels. Bringing him to Boston, particularly at the expense of another player, seems like Theo's attempt to replace Pedro with the gaggle of cheaper, less effective pitchers that plagued Boston in 2005. Besides, a order heart of Youkilis, Ortiz, Drew, Bay, and Lowell (although not necessarily in that order) sounds pretty deadly already...

Bill Lee Cares Not About Your Opinions

An excellent idea for anyone looking to create an Internet sensation: put a microphone in front Bill Lee for a few minutes, give him a starting point, and let him hold forth. Kinda like what happened at the Red Sox Hall of Fame induction ceremony a few days ago. I had read Lee's Little Red (Sox) Book a few years ago, but I had forgotten about how much Lee does not give a crap about what anyone thinks about him: he's here to speak his mind and be clever, all at the same time. Does Lee blog at all? Because if not, he really should.

A few life lessons from The Spaceman:

• Winning is everything. No, really.
  
• When marrying Canadians, make sure the first one is cold before moving on to the second one.
• The Boston media gets the New York media's sloppy seconds.
• We should all be grateful to star players for gracing us with their presence, no matter what the result.

After watching this video, my friend Fred had a good point: Lee's vitriol about Manny may be a bit unfounded, but it's a comment on the long-held Red Sox tradition of crapping on star players when they leave town. After doing a quick mental tally, I can only think of two stars who escaped the pariah treatment when they left the Sox: Williams (he got while playing, instead) and Yaz, who both left because they retired. But Fisk, Lee, Pedro, Damon, Nomar, Manny...they either suffered the Vader force choke from management or the rabid dog attack of the fan base on their way out. It's not a particularly pleasant legacy to contemplate.

Off-Day Thoughts: Pedroia and Ramirez

In the future, when baseball analysts want to gush over a player of small stature who may or may not be worth the spilled ink, they will not discuss his grit or pluck. Instead, they'll call him a caballito and develop a case of the self-satisfied grins, while we all laugh at the possibility that Ortiz actually was screwing with Buck Martinez, punking a whole generation of writers and broadcasters in the process.

Bill Simmons might very well be crazy (although you no doubt knew that): ESPN just published his 9,000 word summation of Manny and the Aftermath in what has to be one of the most exhaustive eulogies ever written by a fan. The first part is a bit cathartic, planting the blame on the ownership and the media for their roles in the debacle, but check out the second half (starting with the "A lesson in revisionist history" section) for Simmons' point: Manny may or may not have manipulated the situation and - no matter how this post-season turns out - he definitely won the war even as he lost the battle, but the real blameworthy individual is Scott Boras, the man who Simmons sees as the evil genius behind the forced trade that broke his heart.

Whether or not Boras nudged Manny into his final confrontation with Boston's management is a matter for conspiracy theorists (although Simmons' premise that Boras could only benefit from signing Manny if he got the slugger a new contract by any means necessary has merit), but Bill has one indisputable conclusion: Manny's departure for LA demonstrates once again that no matter how much we love a player, his first priority will always be to his wallet, not to his fans. Whether or not we can blame anyone for making that choice (especially since we'd all end up doing the exact same thing) is another matter.

Jonathan Papelbon Cares Not For Your Regular Season

More Papelbon: he's really tired of everyone asking him about his recent performance, because he's got that stuff all under control. Seriously, just read the article.

Watching and reading interviews with Papelbon this year, I'm convinced that the guys from The Dugout weren't too far off: he really is the Manny Ramirez of pitching. When he's not talking about pitching, he comes off as either really wacky or a little stupid, but when he's talking his profession, the tumblers seem to fall into place and the knowledge just unlocks. And it's a little scary when it does:

"It's just making adjustments," Papelbon said. "For the past month, I've thrown 20 scoreless innings basically just going out there and throwing my heater and locating it. Well now, the same teams I did that against, they're making their adjustments on me. I've got to get back and do the same. So I've got to be able to throw my secondary pitches and locate my split and locate my slider.

As far as I can tell, Papelbon's treated the past month like some sort of extended side session, going out and fine tuning his best pitch in a live fire environment. As far as I can tell, there's only one reason for him to do so: he's getting ready for the post season. He's so confident that his team will get him to the playoffs that he's moved beyond the day to day of the regular season and he's preparing for the rigors of October baseball. This level of confidence is awesome beyond words.

Jason Bay, Clutch Hero

I know, I know: clutch statistics are meaningless, individual at-bats don't predict anything, Manny is still a phenomenal player, etc., etc. That's the intellect talking, doing its rational thing.

But there's also the heart, and the heart knows this: Jason Bay just hit his third home run in as many games to give the Sox the lead they just might need to put the Rays into the ground. He did it with two outs, with no men on board, with chances dying on the vine like soon to be swirling leaves of Fall. And man, did he look fucking pumped when that sucker went into the Monster Seats, like he was giving voice to every cheering maniac in that crowd.

Jonathan Papelbon: "The Incredible Hulk, But a Little Stronger"

I do love me some Papelbon video, because the guy is probably about as crazy (in that fun way that makes for good TV) as Kevin Millar. Note to the Comcast guys: asking him about safe topics like Mannys is all well and good - MDC has mechanics problems, it's a relief to see Manny Being Manny somewhere else - but that's not why I'm watching. I want to see more of the personally directed questions, because that's where Paps gets to shine. For example: asking him about Chad Johnson contemplating a legal switch to Ocho Cinco and whether or not Paps would do the same was brilliant, because now we know that Cinco Ocho is actually a surpressed personality appears only on the mound and at casino tables. We know the strengths of the talent, people. Let's use them.

The True Psychology of the Wild Buchholz

If this report is true and Manny really wants to go to the Yankees, he knows what will happen any time he comes to Fenway. If he's happy with shooting his Boston legacy in the foot, more power to him.

I was just wondering recently what happened to Devern Hansack; now it looks like he might be taking Wakefield's rotation spot for his next two appearances. An ERA over four in the minors ain't no great shakes, but the WHIP and K/BB ratios both look pretty good. We can certainly use the rotation help right now...

Speaking of which: let's talk (some more) about Clay Buchholz. We know he's unlucky; that statistic hasn't changed since last week. What's caught my eye this week was the Globe's article/interview with the troubled pitcher, which focuses on Buchholz's bad habit of relying on his offspeed pitches to get him out of trouble. Hitters around the league know this habit; they watch and wait for the offspeed stuff like music fans counting the days until Scott Weiland's latest tumble off the wagon, and they let it go flying by. Very quickly, Clay gets into bad counts, everyone starts thinking fastball and next thing we know, he's blowing through three run leads. Clearly the situation requires a new strategy, but unlike Robin I don't think Clay's goose is cooked just yet: no one denies that his stuff works really, really well when it's in the right sequence...and we all know he knows how to sequence properly. The trick is to adjust the sequence, to get, as Buchholz put it himself, "ahead in the count a bit more often where they don't have a choice to swing at off-speed stuff." It'd be great if he could do so this year, but like Lester in 2007, I think the adjustments will take a few months to really take effect.

Manny Breakup Reaches 8th Day, Insanity Dominates

An off day and a columnist's mind turns to thoughts of a left fielder in Los Angeles. Shaughnessy isn't the only one, either: a week later and the sports media that covers the Red Sox is still talking about Manny. Not about the validity of the trade, mind you - except to talk up how well Jason Bay's been hitting or find some definitive statistical proof that Big Papi's lineup protection is a myth - but how well Ramirez has been hitting, how happy he seems, how everyone loves his antics, how the Dodgers will start selling hats with fake Manny dreds attached. Look, we get it: it hurts he left, it hurts that (it seems, at least) that he played his team for personal gain, and it hurts he doesn't suck now that he's playing somewhere else, that karma or poetic justice doesn't seem to apply. The use of "breakup" in the title of this post wasn't just a dig at the frenzy that continues to buzz a week later: Manny's departure has all of the hallmarks of a really nasty end to a relationship, right down to the malicious gossip (Manny's quote about the team - and, by extension, RSN - not deserving him, Schilling's response) and the pain seeing your ex at the club the next weekend, flirting with a group of charmed guys and getting free drinks from the bartender.

But as anyone who's been through a bad breakup knows, the only cure to the bad breakup hangover is to cut the other person out of your life and move on. That's why I don't get it: why Schilling's getting riled that SOSH isn't interested in painting Manny as a bad guy, why Shaughnessy continues writing columns of invective, blaming a guy he never really liked for going somewhere else. The story's over, guys. Time to move on.

Here's To Pie In Your Eye, Jason Bay

Not entirely sure why the clip on this page starts with the Papi pie to the face and concludes with three minutes of Jason Bay wiping off his face instead a bit of a lead up to the pie attack, but that's not what's important: on a scale of one to ten, where one is Manny pushing Youkilis (more sweep under the rug and not fun at all) and ten are the Manny / Papi / Cabrera complicated handshakes of awesomeness from 2004 (or maybe Kevin Millar doing Manny's press conferences), random pies to the face has to be at least a seven. Maybe an eight. It's also the funniest thing this team's done all year, a throwback to the lovable idiots of yesteryear who made that August hot streak a thing of beauty and glory that will live forever in our minds, growing in fondness with time. So yeah: more pies to the face. More random pranks. More Big Papi. Let's make this team of professionals fun on a human level.

Manny Questions are Answered in this Q and bAy (and other bad word plays)

To break this whole Manny trade and Bay pickup deal-e-o I’ve decided to go internal. I will interview… myself… in this in-depth Q and A. Please sit back and enjoy.

Q: Did this Manny deal REALLY need to get done?

A: Oh hell yes. These last few weeks were the final straw in Boston’s love affair with Man-Ram. He can hit the stuffing out of a baseball, but he can burn bridges just as effectively. Besides feuding with teammates (Youk), knocking down team officials and his imaginary injuries… Manny has SAID a ton of stupid things this year too. You can’t have those distractions on a winning team.

Q: Was it a great deal?

A: Oh hell no. You can’t get equal value for a Hall-of-Fame hitter. It doesn’t exist. Plus, throw in the fact that to get a team to take a needy disgruntled player you needed to give up 2 other major league ready players AND pay the rest of his salary… it looks like the Sox got 100% fleeced.

Q: Did they?

A: Not really. Getting rid of Hansen is adding by subtracting. His 5+ ERA and uncanny ability to make blowouts close games will not be missed. Brandon Moss is kind of a sore spot because he would work well in a few places and was a solid 5^th outfielder… but it’s still a backup. And as I stated before… you needed to get Manny out of town. So getting Jason Bay is some really good return on a desperate deal.

Q: What Soundgarden song where you thinking of when the trade was announced?

A: Limo Wreck.

“Building the towers, belongs to the sky
When the whole thing comes crashing down
Don't ask me why”

Q: What feelings were going through your mind when the Manny trade unfolded?

A: Well if the song in any indication, I was ready to write off the season and the team for the foreseeable future. I felt everyone was giving up for no reason. Why not join them?

Q: What was the most shocking moment for you in this whole ordeal?

A: Hearing about the secret meeting between Theo and Sox veterans where everyone agreed that Manny needed to go. Wow. This blew me away. ALL the vets invited wanted him gone? That’s almost unbelievable that nobody was coming to his aid. There must have been so many behind the scene things with Manny that nobody knew about or maybe the idiot savant routine gets old if you are around it all day.

Q: Who got too much blame in this ordeal?

A: I think Theo got a bit too much crap from the fans and media. What the hell was he supposed to do with a player who didn’t want to play? Manny put the Sox in an un-winnable situation that wasn’t going to go away like the last few debacles. This was the end of his contract and the Sox almost got stuck getting nothing for him. Good on Theo for pulling the trigger and getting at least a bat back.

Q: Who deserves more ire than they received?

A: Scott Boras got off with a slap on the wrist in my mind. He barely got a dirty look and he should have gotten at lease 4 or 5 evil stares. This guy takes over Manny at the beginning of the season and Manny being Manny becomes Manny being Madonna for a half season. You don’t think Boras wasn’t saying “Manny you are the best, but they don’t respect you. Are you gonna take that?” on a daily basis? Boras doesn’t get paid if Manny can’t land a fat contract with free agency… so why make him happy in one place? Screw that meddling bloodsucker.

Q: Funniest joke from the Manny trade?

A: Well there are a few:

Manny traded to Moon. Blocked deal when he found out that it wasn’t made of cheese.

Manny to Seattle. Blocked deal when he found out that Sonics season tickets are nonexistent.

Manny to Green Bay for Brett Favre. Yeah, but where are we gonna play him?

Manny to Mars. Blocks trade when he finds out women are from Venus.

Manny to Dodgers so he can play with Nomar and Derek Lowe. Oh wait… no joke… and they are managed by Joe Torre. See? Real life is way better.

Q: So after you talked yourself into the deal, what Soundgarden song popped into your head?

A: Fresh Tendrils:

“Long time coming
It seemed to take me through
Long time coming
Many served the few”

Q: So after his first game, what do you think of Jason Bay?

A: Wow… umm I hate these rush decisions. I mean come on! One game? What a small sample size. Sure he scored both Sox runs, but what does that mean?

Q: No really. Are you now a Bay fan?

A: Hmmm tough to say. I love him… but am I in love with him? I know it’s too soon and he is just a rebound star. But wow… that Canadian grin, sharp ringing triple and sexy OBP? Please Jason, lets get some Molson and just go crazy on each other. Just you me and a bag of bats… call me?