The Last Night of Spring Training

Anyone else feel that last night's slugging match was the last real Spring Training game and we won't start counting towards the standings until the Sox and Yanks play again tomorrow night? The pitching was generally wretched, the umpiring at first base so bad that I thought we were watching the 2009 playoffs all over again, and that ugly double whatever it was that allowed a New York run to score while the ball was in a player's glove in the infield gave the lie to the vacuum-like defense supposedly under Boston's command. With that supposedly deficient Red Sox offense, I might be forgiven for thinking the night was sunk after the Yankees pulled ahead in the fourth.

Of course, led by Mr. First-Hometown-Triple-Since-1999, the offense beat expectations and fought back twice, giving Youkilis the hero status and a prophet-like status thanks to his Spring Training utterance:

“Hey guys,’’ he shouted out to his teammates that February morning. “Can we score a bunch of runs on Opening Night so we don’t have to hear about this anymore?’’

Clearly the man knows things. We should all listen to him, no matter how crazy he sounds:

How to Age a Buchholz

Clay Buchholz, Nick Swisher, and an actor by the name of Adam Scott are in a new ESPN commercial - Buchholz and Scott are singing "Sweet Caroline," and they try to get Swisher to join in, and of course he won't because he plays for the Yankees. You can watch the whole thing below, but I'm posting it not because it's particularly funny, but because for the first time, Clay Buchholz looks older than 12 years of age. I actually had to watch the whole commercial twice, because I didn't realize it was him; I kept looking for a guy who looked like someone out of a Little League photo. Maybe they gave him sort of aging serum before the shoot.

Alas, Poor Lowrie

It's funny: Jed Lowrie's time out with injuries were such a big part of his 2009 season that I forgot that his time away from the majors in 2008 had more to do with the Julio Lugo experiment and Lowrie's suckiness resulting from his hidden injury, not time on the DL. As a result, when I saw the headline that doctors have diagnosed him with mononucleosis, my first, entirely irrational thought was that he's cursed. Now that I've refreshed myself on his transaction history, I realize he's just unlucky: he hurt in himself in 2008, did enough damage to miss the first half of 2009, compounded problems with additional arm-related issues at the end of the season, and now, as he's still seeking to establish himself as a reliable player, he comes down with a disease that people normally get when they're in middle school.

Of course, he still looks like he's in middle school, so maybe we shouldn't be surprised. I wish him luck, but I'm not holding my breath about his taking over Scutaro's job any time soon.

One Last Hurrah for Nomar

Sometimes, the Red Sox are weird. Really, that's an understatement: they do odd things all the time, but those odd things usually have some sort of competitive purpose behind them, rich in statistical reason but a bit baffling to the average fan's sense of logic. They'll acquire a guy like Mike Lowell, for example, in a move that looks like agreeing to take out someone else's garbage so you can have their Ferrari - after you've already thrown in your Porsche, of course - and then that garbage will turn out to consist almost entirely of gold bars and stock options to Berkshire Hathaway.

That might be the most complicated metaphor I've ever written on this site.

Point is: sometimes they do things that are weird and out of character with their straitlaced competitive style and more of a throwback to the nostalgic view of the Yawkey years. Like letting an old man sit in the dugout because he's a living symbol of dedication, or naming a foul pole after a guy who hit a particularly dramatic home run. Or, today, signing a one-day deal with an iconic shortstop so he can retire as a member of the Red Sox.

Six years later, the Nomar relationship - such as it is - is less complicated. As Francona commented today, explaining, in essence, why this return full circle makes sense, "He was kind of Boston-ed out." I can understand why: as a fan base, we're overbearing and obnoxious. We care too much about our pro sports teams, we put the performance of every athlete under a microscope, and we're not afraid to express admiration or disgust - or to vacillate the public face between the two at lightning speeds. I'm not sure I'd want to play in Boston.

But time and distance seem to change things. Garciaparra had one last blaze of glory with the Dodgers in 2006, but he no doubt realized his best years were in Boston. Unlike Manny, who did his best to become a person non-grata when he became Boston-ed out, Nomar didn't incur fan ire when he left, and the crowd approval on his return to Fenway last April was tremendous and touching to watch. So Nomar likely lost most of the bitterness that made him want to leave. In the same article announcing his retirement, Theo noted that the two men had maintained some sort of relationship after the trade, and clearly got to the point where they separated business and personal. They were able to work out this unusual deal, and the tall, thin guy from California with the OCD batting rituals and the infield acrobatics came back to the Sox one last time. And really, as odd as it is as a concept, it's pretty cool way to go out.

He's Wicked Smaht, Hey

In addition to being a victim of a height-related Doppler shift that causes a person to see him at a different height depending on viewpoint, it appears that Dustin Pedroia is possessed of razor-sharp mind that can cut through the fat of today's detritus-laden baseball chatter and go right to the bone. Run prevention, for example, holds no truck with the People's Champion:

"'I don’t even buy into that stuff. We have great pitching, we have great defense, and we have good offensive players,' he said. 'I don’t even know what run prevention is. I’m a baseball player. I don’t know how to read very good; I don’t know how to write very good. We just go play, man. That’s it. We’ll be fine.'"

Dustin Pedroia: 2008 MVP and Gold Glove winner, 2007 Rookie of the Year, master of the Queen's (President's?) English. There can be no finer option to man the dusty paths between first and second base.

Dice-K Speaks!

This article might be the best thing I've read about the Sox all winter. Ok, that might be hyperbole; I'm sure if I had a gun to my head, I'd say that, given its timing, the Lackey signing was the best thing I heard this winter, but hearing that Matsuzaka is not only being up front with his employers about a potential injury but confessing to the media that this admission is a sign that he's turned a corner when it comes to talking about being hurt gives me a lot more confidence in his reliability for this season. Here's why:

Earlier this week, I was watching some late night TV when I came across a sports show on the prospects of the Mets. The show had one of NYC's sports journalists on as a guest expert, and he was in the process of running through the pitching staff when I tuned in. Not that this should surprise any of you, but the essence of his comments was: Santana is Santana. Everyone else is a question mark whose ultimate usefulness depends the cooperation of a few different factors and healthy sprinkling of fairy dust. Thankfully, Boston's staff isn't in nearly such tough shape, but without knowing how well Matsuzaka had learned the lesson of injury honesty, his presence made the fourth or fifth pitching slot as much a mystery as the ones facing the fans of the team in Flushing. Which is huge, huge news: no one wants to be like the Mets.

Truck Day!

There may still be enough snow in the garden in front of my apartment to contemplate building Calvin-style snow sculptures, but today from Boston leaves a vehicle that, like the return of the robin, promises the onset of spring. "Truck Day": two simple words that promise the arrival of days when the sun's light provides more than a mockery of warmth, when the touch of the breeze no longer feels like an icy assault, when the stark skeletal growth of trees softens under a bower of green. But most important, Truck Day means Pitchers and Catchers, and Pitchers and Catchers means Spring Training, and Spring Training means Baseball. Sweet, sweet baseball. Your return cannot come soon enough, I promise.

Would You Want to be Called an Injury in Waiting?

The first part of Nick Cafardo's notes column from yesterday discusses the odd circumstances of Jason Bay's departure, tying his decision to leave to Boston's insistence on a contract with protection clauses against injury. Cafardo points out that Lackey and Drew both agreed to take pay cuts or lose options if they become injured, suspects that Boston will require the same stipulations of Beckett and Papelbon, and noted that Dr. Thomas Gill, the team physician who questioned the strength of Bay's shoulder, made the prescient call on the future of Pedro. As you might expect, all of these points lead up to coup de grace indictment of Bay's decision:

What’s puzzling is that if he felt so confident about his physical condition, and understood how good Fenway and Boston were to him, why wouldn’t he go along with the medical provisions, just as some prominent teammates had? If the Sox - according to Bay’s version - were willing to go three guaranteed years and a fourth year with medical protection at $15 million per year, what was so offensive about that?

I expect the answer is little simpler than Cafardo expects: even though four years at Fenway would likely make Bay's numbers far more attractive than four years at Citi Field, choosing to accept a medical provision brands Bay as a player with suspect boy body parts, even if he makes it all four years without injury. At the end of his contract, Bay would be in his mid-30s, already looking at less money as his career declines, and wouldn't want to carry the value-lowering label of potential injury in the bargain. He may be screwed either way: by declining a medical provision while insisting he's healthy, he gives power to the argument that he's an injury waiting to happen, but I can understand why he might have chosen the contract with the Mets as the lesser of two evils.

Theo Epstein Cares Not For Your Arbitration

I was going to look over the news of the Papelbon signing without comment, until it occurred to me that the Sox just rewarded a decline in performance with the largest contract ever given to a fourth-year closer. The Globe puts the numbers pretty well:

His ERA was down from 2008 (2.34), but perhaps the more notable change was his WHIP (walks plus hits per inning pitched), which increased to a career-high 1.15. His WHIP was 0.95 in 2008 and 0.77 in 2007. His strikeout-to-walk ratio also sank to a career low (for any of his full seasons in the majors) of 3.17-1. He put up a mark of 9.63-1 in 2008 and 5.60-1 in 2007. He set a career high in walks with 24.

The new deal comes after the expiration of a deal that made him the highest paid first-year arbitration-eligible closer, and two years after the deal that broke the record for highest salary to a non-arbitration-eligible closer...and four months after the blown save that ended the season in a sweep. I'm not saying that Papelbon is washed up or shouldn't be paid as an elite closer, but even if the Sox are keeping the money on a short leash because they think they'll replace Papelbon with Bard in a year or two, why pay an arbitration-eligible player that much more just to keep things from moving to the arbiter? My theory: it's Theo's arbitration-free streak that make Boston willing to pay more, even if the numbers suggest they're taking a risk. After all, it seems logical that keeping younger players from having to go to a third party to make the money they think is fair would give the Sox a reputation as a place where young players would want to sign, making signing draft picks and motivating minor league talent a little easier.

Big Surprise: Dice-K Hid an Injury Last Year

And he hurt himself while training for the World Baseball Classic, so despite what Ichiro might say, we've got another injury to lay at the feet of the WBC. And he hid it from the Red Sox all year, but that's no surprise: players have to walk the line between developing a reputation as a wimp who hurts his team by resting every injury and playing so hurt they're under-performing, and they're going to make a decision here and there that looks terrible in retrospect. What's troubling about the story is that once again it was a Japanese media outlet that broke the story. Maybe Dice-K feels more comfortable talking to journalists when he doesn't need a translator - that seems to be the implication, anyway, because he keeps breaking these stories to journalists in Japan - but if he's going to make an announcement like this one, why not have a press conference and spread the word at large? It feels like he's either thinking word won't get back to the English language press, which is clearly ridiculous, because it keeps happening, or this particular admission - and every one he's made thus far - was something he admittedly only after some probing questioning, which suggests he didn't intend to tell the public in the first place.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Your Boston Braves!

Because they're so focused on pitching and defense this year, you see. With the Lackey signing, Hermida getting his chance after all, and the acquisition of Beltre and his enormous bat of unimpressiveness, we're excited about the pitching staff, downplaying the holes in the lineup, and talking defense. Like geeky defense, the kind where the papers start talking about how many runs a third baseman like Beltre will save over Lowell:

The move is in line with the Sox’ stated desire to improve their run prevention. Beltre is an above average fielder, earning a 14.3 ultimate zone rating according to fangraphs.com. Contrast that with Lowell’s minus 10.4 UZR (or just ask a scout), and it’s clear the Sox have dramatically upgraded their defense at the position for 2010 and possibly beyond.

All well and good: if you can reduce the performance of players to an equation and determine that Beltre's stronger glove and weaker bat will generate more runs than Lowell's weaker glove and stronger bat, and balance in the cost of choosing Beltre over Youkilis when the only alternate is Casey Kotchman, the decision makes some sort of sense. Everything comes down to runs eventually, so if your defense-heavy team saves more runs than it gives up by being light in the offense department, you win ball games and don't look like an idiot for not trying to compete with the Yankees.

Except there's one problem: the Yankees were already pretty good in one category (pitching) and even better in another (offense) last year and they won the World Series. This year they might actually be a bit better - I'm thinking about the Granderson acquisition here in particular - and Boston's response is to jettison offense and hope the results come out in the wash. It might work, but I think as interesting as this Boston team seems for the new decade, we've got another summer of second place running to look forward to.

I'm John Lackey!

Happy New Year. This Fitzy episode is from months ago, but it occurs to me that it's even funnier after the Lackey signing:

Who Would You Rather Have: Bay or Hermida?

Because it's starting to look like we're going to have both. Bay's request for more time and loot than Boston's 4 year, $60 million offer has met with no takers except the Mets (4 years, $65 million), and Bay either doesn't like his potential numbers in Citi Field or he'd rather not sign with a team that's made spectacular season blowups a regular habit, because his agent is trying to resurrect interest from the Sox front office. Meanwhile, Nick Cafardo has some thoughts on how Jeremy Hermida will never develop the big bat he's reputed to sport - Cafardo makes some Ortiz comparisons - if he's playing fourth or fifth outfield with Cameron/Bay/Ellsbury/Drew/whomever. With the team in the process of assembling a group that seems better suited to win today than tomorrow relying on Hermida's offensive development doesn't seem like a good strategy, but the more I think about it, the more I think what Cafardo is saying makes sense: if this guy really is a slugger in the making, let's see what he's got and take advantage while he's in Boston.

Wacky for Lackey

So...despite my vitriolic assertions to the contrary, I guess The Boof wasn't Boston's only off-season move for the pitching staff, what with the John Lackey signing and all. In fact, I might even be willing to say that I completely acknowledge the error of my ways and resolve - once again - to never criticize the methods behind the madness that is the front office, because - despite all of the odd experiments - the Sox keep making these deals that make so much sense. With Lackey, they now have:

• A superior starting pitching staff that's on the verge of becoming 2007-like godly if Matsuzaka carries his form from the last four starts of 2009 into 2010. We thought the '09 staff had an excellent chance of dominating the field in Spring Training, but the success of even that illustrious group required a blessing of the stars; besides the Dice-K question, all the 2010 Sox need ask of their starters is for health and consistency with their already established numbers.
• A trade piece in odd man out Clay Buchholz, who'll have the chance to become the "maybe he'll make it" ornament of some other team's staff. Buchholz becomes trade bait for the bat the Sox will need to replace Bay, now that they've elected to...
  
• ...sign Mike Cameron and choose defense over offense in left field. The deal has everyone saying farewell to the likable-but-expensive Jason Bay and those Gay for Bay t-shirts Robin planned to market, but frees up money for one of those expensive contracts the Sox will likely acquire with Bay's offensive replacement.

Of course, we can't celebrate a successful hot stove season just yet: someone has to agree to make the trade that makes the Cameron acquisition worthwhile at a price that doesn't make us cry for a mortgaged future or (even worse) a missed opportunity. Anyone got a player with .896 (or better) OPS they can spare?

They Get Granderson, We Get...The Boof

Dan Shaughnessy has a column in the Globe this morning about how the Sox are selling us a bill of goods by talking about a "bridge period" in the team's development instead of pushing to sign the players that'll make the team competitive against the Yankees next year. I had intended to write the whole thing off as the usual crank trash that Shaughnessy likes to write, but then two things happened: first, I read Joe Posnanski's post on how much of a steal the Granderson deal was for the Yankees and the full impact of that trade finally hit me after several days of denial. Then, I went to Boston.com to look for the Shaughnessy column again so I could blog about it and the Lowell trade speculation and saw this on the home page (I've added a red underline to underscore the point):

I almost choked on my breakfast when I saw that. The Boof?!? A 28-year-old pitcher with an injury history as long as his surgically repaired arm, 96 appearances in four seasons, and a career 5.12 ERA? I get the timing is coincidental, but damn: the Yankees boost their already formidable lineup with a righty whose swing seems tailor-made for the Stadium and the Sox get a pitcher with a ridiculous nickname on his last shot for major league success. To say things seem inequitable with a poor chance of improvement is an understatement.

When Playing Hurt is Rational and Irrational All at Once

I would like to call Manny Delcarmen an idiot. I really would: because he pitched secretly hurt for half the season, he looked like he had completely lost his edge, and made us question whether or not he belonged on the team. After all, a healthy Manny Delcarmen may not make the difference between a first-round exit and a World Series victory, but he's still a piece of that all-so-important functioning bullpen and therefore responsible for an additional win or two.

So I would love to blame him, but I can't: if an athlete in 2009 feels like they have to hide their injury, it's a symptom of a larger social problem, where players are so worried about looking they have the competitive spirit that they sacrifice health for the game and make themselves less effective in the process. It's an irrational stance to take, which is why it bothers me: in a perfect world (in my head, anyway), players would not play when they were hurt and people would not judge them for lacking the competitive spirit. Alas, this perfect world does not exist, so we have the next flawed thing: a player has to make the decision about whether or not it's more important to be judged by their competitive ability or their health and some - like Delcarmen - choose competitive ability over health as a rational decision and end up losing both.

The Amazing, Flexible Pedroia

Now it all makes sense: letting the market empty of potential shortstops was part of the front office's plan all along! While we were all zigging and trying to talk ourselves into settling for a Marco Scutaro/Jed Lowrie combo package, the Sox were zagging and talking to Pedroia about switching from second to short in 2010.

Well, that's the rumor, anyway. It's not a confirmed thing and - given the quotes Pedroia gave to the Herald when quizzed about the possible move - something that may be more in his head than anywhere else. In fact, for all of the move's logic - because after all, it's a lot easier to find a decent second baseman than it is to find a decent shortstop - it's giving me some deja vu. After all, it was a little over three years ago when Alex Gonzalez last left Boston and we were asking the same questions then that we are now, even if the circumstances are a little different.

Playing Marco Polo in the Dwindling Shortstop Pool

Well, I'm glad the Sox settled the shortstop question quickly and easily, providing some sort of continuity at a position that's had steady of stream of different warm bodies for far too long. Wait, just kidding.

Now that Gonzalez is definitely out of the picture for 2010, removing another possibility from a market both weak in options and rapidly tightening as the month has progressed, we've got a run at Marco Scutaro to look forward to. As Fire Brand of the American League points out in a slightly convoluted metaphor, Scutaro might have finally hit whatever summit he's going to have in his baseball career - his splits for 2009 were .282/.379/.409, far above his career totals of .265/.337/.384 - but that'll make him far too popular for those teams in need. In other words, expect Boston to overpay, quite possibly with a contract that'll keep Scutaro around for a year or two too long, because they don't have the leverage.

I'd be really happy if this deal works out to Boston's advantage, but I suspect we're in for something closer to the Renteria deal, with a bit higher of an upside: Scutaro hits well enough for a year, but tails off in 2011 (when he turns 35) and turns into dead-weight trade bait that the Sox dump for minor leaguers who never make a big contribution. Jed Lowrie, meanwhile, remains haunted by the after-effects of his broken wrist and never blossoms into the player we've stopped expecting him to become.

A Little Hot Stove Housekeeping

The Sox did some housekeeping today: they declined Gonzalez's ($6 million) and Varitek ($5 million)'s options, picked up Martinez's $7.7 million option, and changed Wakefield's perpetual club option into a two-year, $4 million deal. The business with catchers isn't surprising, but I'm a little baffled by the Gonzo choice. Presumably Boston is hedging its bets, slipping in the possibility of picking up a draft pick if Gonzalez declines to prolong his tenure and ends up somewhere else, but are things really that sure at shortstop next year that they can afford to make this bet? It's not like the shortstop free agent market is aces this off season and Jed Lowrie...well, we all know he's nothing like a sure thing, either. I guess we'll see what the Sox have planned.

As for Wakefield: does the new deal mean that Wake has a retirement date in mind? The perpetual option was fun because, quite frankly, it allowed us (or me, anyway) to live out a fantasy where Wakefield entered some sort of relativistic universe where age meant nothing and he could keep pitching forever, but clearly the injuries of this past season dealt that particular hope a crushing blow. If Wake's feeling his age enough to sign a time-limited deal - or the Sox are worried enough about his health to send him down that road - the true end can't be that far behind.

ALDS Game 3: Seconds

ALDS Game 3: Boston Red Sox 6, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 7

It takes seconds to say good bye to the end of a season...about the time it takes for the ball to leave Pedroia's bat and fall into Aybar's glove, or Chone Figgins to walk to first base at the start of a rally that wouldn't end until it was just too late. Afterward, we can debate the hows and whys until we're blue in the face: maybe the Angels were too good, or the Red Sox were not hungry enough, or the magic that we've come to rely on to spark those magnificent come-from-behind victories is sparking another team's fire this year; but it doesn't really matter: we started with promise in the Spring, and ended with cold defeat in the waning of the year.

However, despite the dismal result, I'm grateful for two things:

1. The offense finally woke up. Even a blowout isn't as frustrating as watching opportunities to score slip away like the hours of a Sunday afternoon and for two games, slippage was all we had to look forward to. As painful as the ending was to watch, it would have been worse to end the day with no hope at all.
   
   
2. That we made it this far. I'm not going to turn into a fan for whom nothing but World Series victory is acceptable. Especially after the absolutely depressing end of the 2006 season when the wheels fell off the train long before the end of September, I'd rather face a sweep in the first round of the playoffs than nothing at all.
   

ALDS Game 2: Living Bad Dreams

ALDS Game 2: Boston Red Sox 1, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 4

When I woke up yesterday morning, I had really hoped the complete and total lack of hitting was just a one-time failure; a product of really good pitching and a really bad night. This morning, I'm starting to wonder if we're in some sort of terrible dream, where those at-bats that do turn into base runners are few and far between; where rallies are devoured by a ravenous beast wearing a big, haloed A.

So the offense is in one of the worst-timed slumps possible and it seems for the moment that they won't be scoring a lot of runs in their traditional high-explosive style. In fact, looking back to September 21, when the Red Scare lost that game against Kansas City and the slide that landed the Sox firmly in the 2009 Wild Card slot really started, it doesn't seem like they've hit that well against above average pitching. Maybe this slump is a long time coming; maybe now that they're once again up against the wall they'll start to click again and we'll all be laughing about these first two steps down the road to a champagne-less ending to October.

However, regardless of what happens when the series resumes in Boston mid-day Sunday, I think these first two games have proven that Tito needs a faster hook on his starters. Elite veterans though Lester and Beckett may be, the lack of run support demands perfection from the starting pitcher, which becomes a smaller and smaller possibility as the game goes on. It's true that the bullpen isn't always perfect either, but changing things up before tight situations get really tight - when the starter gives up three or four runs - may be the only way to win right now.

ALDS Game 1: Mood for Trouble

ALDS Game 1: Boston Red Sox 0, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 5

Dedicated to Robin, who knows why.

Last night was all about trouble. Take the sterling effort by the defense, for example. Normally you'd write it off as first-time playoff jitters, except that every man, infield and outfield, behind the plate and on the mound, had been to the post-season before. Yet somehow, these experienced fielders who'd played together for half a season couldn't execute three times, chalking up three errors over the course of the game...

Oh wait. At least one of those "errors" was the fault of this guy. Poor execution doesn't help keep the pitch count low, but neither does blindness by the officiating. Maybe tonight they'll relegate Bucknor to one of the outfield positions where he won't do as much damage. So the defense was trouble, but the umpires were trouble, too.

The offense generally looked like the hacks they were taking, but that's to be expected: Lester might have pitched decently, but Lackey was generally on fire and with the exception of one jam that the Sox managed to waste by looking like Bucknor flailing in the wind, was pretty much unhittable. I distinctly remember one pitch to Ortiz where the bottom fell out of the ball right as he swung and while it broke my heart, it really was a beautiful pitch to see. You'll notice the pattern continues: the offense was trouble. Lester was trouble, because he gave up four walks.

There was trouble from all sides then in Game 1. Tonight they'll come back out and try things again and just maybe they'll look like they belong in the post-season. Because otherwise, we're in trouble.

I Think We All Know What Needs to be Done...

Kevin Youkilis, A Man Afire

Jackie MacMullen's profile on Youkilis - or maybe more on Youkilis's intensity - is a great read, but is anyone surprised at all that:

• Boston fans love Youkilis for being the guy who made good by working hard and beating the odds. I'd say that's probably going to be the case no matter where Youkilis played, because it's a part of the American national myth: we love self-reliance and work ethic and we love the underdog. Put them together and you get some sort of living legend with an awesome beard.
  
  
• Pedroia doesn't think Youkilis should change a thing. If you took Kevin Youkilis, shrunk him down a few inches, and gave him a complex from people either underestimating him for his height or seeing him like the second coming of David Eckstein, you'd have Dustin Pedroia. On a side note: how lucky are we to have a left side of the infield that's so committed they don't understand why people think they're a little crazy and really good at their jobs?
  
  
• Some of the other players find Youkilis a bit much. I can understand that: his intensity is a lot of fun to watch and makes me love him as a player, but I'm trying to imagine a co-worker who blew up at himself in public every time he missed a minor deadline and I can imagine it would make things pretty uncomfortable.
  

Nervous About the Playoffs

I suspect many of you are asking yourselves right now: 'Has there ever been a 95-win team that seemed more of a long shot coming into the playoffs?' Maybe it's some combination of finishing second to a 103 game-winning Yankee team, the severely lackadaisical turn the team seemed to take after losing those first two games to the Royals, and how many of Boston's positions seemed to be filled by a combination of tape, glue, and odd luck, but going into this ALDS - whenever it starts - I'm more nervous about Boston's chances against Anaheim than I've been in the past - and that's not just because the Angels have so much to prove. I mean, if you'd told me in April that Boston's solid group of options in the field and on the mound would be rife with injuries and missing major pieces by mid-season, or that Francona would be juggling a combination of Lowell, Youkilis, Varitek, and Martinez across three positions by August to keep Lowell and Varitek in playing shape for October, I would have been quite surprised.

Actually, I suppose I wouldn't have been surprised about either Lowell or Varitek: they're a combined age of 10,000 years old and have one good hip between the two of them. But the rest was a surprise.

Adding to my feelings of uncertainty is a little fun with small sample sizes: for whatever reason, it's taken 95 or more wins to get to the playoffs this decade. Boston has six 95+ win teams since the 2000 season. Two of those teams won it all; three teams met the agony of defeat, including two edge-of-the-seat ALCS losses; and one team is still in the process of writing its own history. Here's where it gets a little odd: the teams that won it all had more than 95 wins. The teams that did not had 95 wins.

See how I've already psyched myself out? I'm drawing patterns from meaningless data. I may not feel better until the Sox have exacted another sweep from the Angels.