The Baseball Desert

The End

2009-02-16T19:44:00.003+01:00

It doesn't take a genius to see that this site has been on life support for more time that I care to mention: 40 posts in the past year - including 12 in the month of October and none since November 4th - is not the stuff of which blogging legends are made. Well, today I'm finally switching off the machine and declaring The Baseball Desert clinically dead.

I admit to having been holding on to see if the time and energy to blog re-surfaced at all, but I'm sad to say they haven't. Part of me is glad, because that means that the time I used to spend sat in front of a computer screen ranting about baseball is now being spent doing other things (including a job I love). The other part of me is saying goodbye with a lot of regret, because this project, which started out as just a way to avoid talking to random brick walls, has allowed me to make friends - both real and virtual - across the world, and to share some magical baseball moments that just would not have been the same otherwise. It might have begun life as a desert, but it allowed me to find a team, a community and a sense of belonging.

Thank you to all those readers - both loyal and casual - who have stopped by here over the past 5 1/2 years. I would like to hope that the random musings of some English guy occasionally amused, entertained and maybe even enlightened you. From my end, your interest and comments and occasional insults are what made all of this worthwhile.

I know from experience that this Internet thingy can be addictive, so I may be back at some point in the future, wearing a new suit, but in the meantime, take care, be safe and Go Sox!

Day of reckoning

2008-11-04T12:16:00.005+01:00

Those who come here regularly will know - and those who don't can guess from the name - that this is primarily a baseball blog. I don't do any of life's really major subjects (religion, politics, ...). However, today I'm going to make an exception and do both in one very short post:

Dear America,

For the love of God, don't fuck this one up:

Thanks,
Iain

'Big Game' James

2008-10-19T06:07:00.001+02:00

Apparently, ALCS games don't count as big.

(Don't Fear) The Reaper

2008-10-17T12:20:00.003+02:00

So it appears there will indeed be more cowbell: Game 6, Saturday night at the Trop.

I almost gave up on this game, at around 3.30am, with the Rays up 5-0 and a huge 9am meeting looming large, but I'm glad I didn't, as I got to see nothing less than the second-biggest comeback in postseason history. That's why they play the games, folks - it ain't ever over until it's over...

I had my doubts yesterday - and even after last night's magic there's still a mountain to climb - but for today at least, I'm ten feet tall and bulletproof.

Pick your cliché

2008-10-16T08:48:00.003+02:00

"Win or go home", "Backs to the wall", "One game at a time". They're all being said, and, as is often the case with clichés, they're all true.

The rational me really doesn't know whether this team has what it takes to climb out of the hole they've dug for themselves, but the optimistic anything's-possible-in-baseball me keeps remembering other seasons and other deep holes they climbed out of.

The Sox seem to be in the right frame of mind for the game. If the bats turn up and Daisuke does his thing, a flight back to Tampa for Game 6 could be on the cards.

"The least marketable skill in America"

2008-10-13T21:50:00.001+02:00

If you need to stay loose before the game, may I suggest you check out Batting Stance Guy's 2008 Playoff Red Sox.

Genius.

(Hat tip: Fire Brand of the American League).

Rant (continued)

2008-10-12T14:14:00.003+02:00

MEMO

To: TBS
Cc: Bud Selig
Re: ALCS

Dear TBS,

I know you think these images of kids asleep in the stands are cute, but ask yourselves this question: why are they asleep in the first place?

BECAUSE SOME TV BASEBALL MARKETING GENIUS DECIDED THAT THE BEST TIME TO START PLAYOFF GAMES IS AFTER 8PM ET! Way to go, morons...

On behalf of future generations of non-fans I'd like to say: "Thanks for nothing."

Iain

He said, he said

2008-10-12T14:01:00.003+02:00

Rational Iain: You know, we had no business even being in the 11th inning. Josh Beckett - Commander Kick-Ass himself - gave up 8 earned runs in 4 1/3 innings. It's a miracle we even made it that far.

Tired, Grumpy, Been-Up-All-Night, Saw-This-Coming-A-Mile-Off Iain: Hey, go take your cheery, it's-October-baseball disposition and stick it where the sun don't shine.

RI: The Sox showed great character to claw their way back - they never gave up.

TGBUANSTCAMOI: Yeah, except when they sent Timlin in to pitch. Five stellar scoreless innings from the bullpen and the game ends walk, walk, intentional walk, sac fly.

RI: Well, he did get a couple of horrendous calls.

TGBUANSTCAMOI: He should never have been in there to even get those calls. I'd rather have seen Paul Byrd in there. Shit, I'd rather have seen Sean Casey in there.

RI: C'mon - you're being a little harsh on the guy.

TGBUANSTCAMOI: Harsh?! You think this is harsh? Wait 'til the coffee kicks in and I'll show you harsh. I go to bed at 10 to be up in time for the game. Thanks to our noisy neighbours, I get to sleep at about 11.30. Wake up at 2. Switch on the TV, only to find the cable channels are playing up and I've got a frozen image of a football game from earlier in the evening. Settle for watching the game on the laptop. Sit through five innings of dross from Beckett. Watch the Sox claw their way back into the game. Then, after 5+ hours of baseball, at around 7.15 on a Sunday morning, when any reasonable human being would be tucked up in bed dreaming of café au lait and warm brioche, what do I get? MIKE FREAKIN' TIMLIN, THREE BASE ON BALLS AND A WALK-OFF SAC FLY!

RI: Hmmm...I can kinda see your point.

TGBUANSTCAMOI: You'll see it even clearer if you don't piss off and leave me alone.

RI: So, you're not putting on your happy face for this gorgeous, Indian summer Sunday in Paris?

TGBUANSTCAMOI: Indian summer means sunshine. Sunshine means rays. So, erm, no.

RI: We'll get 'em tomorrow at Fenway.

TGBUANSTCAMOI: Stay well away from me if we don't...

Crystal bollocks

2008-10-11T12:21:00.003+02:00

I look at the image above and see eggs; Dan Shaughnessy looks at it and sees chickens, all fully hatched.

This article doesn't bother me so much from the "don't jinx the Sox" angle (although, like any baseball fan, that did cross my mind) as it does from the "look at the facts" angle. Shaughnessy compares this Sox team to the '04 team and talks about the unstoppable run it went on. What he singularly fails to see is that before going on that unstoppable run, they managed to find themselves down three games down to the Yankees. I'm just curious to know, since the Sox themselves proved you can come back from 0-3 in the ALCS, what magical prediction tools Shaughnessy is using to write the Rays off after a single loss.

I know I should be celebrating and focusing on all the positives of winning Game 1 at the Trop, but minor jet-lag and major fatigue have got me all grumpy this morning , and Shaughnessy's smug piece of pseudo-journalism just pushed the wrong buttons. Hopefully I'll be back later, this time with my happy face on.

Vote now!

2008-10-04T23:59:00.003+02:00

Apologies to those who might feel I'm harping on here, but this was just too good to pass up:

Smash and grab

2008-10-04T09:02:00.003+02:00

Outside of Vladimir Guerrero (who I liked way back when he played for the Expos), I don't like the Angels, and never have. I get particularly wound up by Francisco Rodriguez, so this:

(Getty images)

leading to this, is sweet.

It looked like the Angels were going to claw their way back into the game, but in the ninth the Sox not only kicked 'em squarely in the nuts but also proceeded to steal their lunch money, which is about as good as it gets at 7.30 on a Saturday morning.

-------

This just occurred to me: K-ROD is DORK spelled backwards. No comment...

Three wishes

2008-10-03T09:59:00.003+02:00

In order:

1) Sox sweep the Angels in three.

Always the most satisfying outcome of any series. Would allow the Sox to rest up before the next series.

2) Sox win in four.

Still good. Would allow the Sox to clinch at Fenway and still give them time to rest before the next series.

3) Sox in in five.

Would have Red Sox Nation biting its nails until Wednesday, but I have to confess - in case the gods of baseball are listening - that this is my secret favourite wish of the three, because on Wednesday night I'll be in Washington, D.C. on business, and instead of watching the game alone in my living-room at 3am I could go and cheer the Sox on somewhere like this.

Damn statistics

2008-10-02T16:26:00.003+02:00

The Sox may have defeated the Angels last night, but they can't defeat the stats:

(MLB.com)

Gentlemen - time to start evening up that ALDS record...

Oops

2008-10-02T09:43:00.004+02:00

(photo: AP)

I read somewhere yesterday (but can't for the life of me remember where) that the Angels and their attitude could basically be summed up in the idea of always trying to go from first to third. It's therefore a little ironic that they blew themselves out of a potential big 8th inning when Vlad tried to do just that.

That mistake kept the Angels' tally at one, and that was all Meesrs. Lester, Masterson and Papelbon needed. Great pitching, a two-run home run from Jason Bay, a highlight-reel catch from Ellsbury and Game 1 was in the bag.

I had hoped the Sox would steal at least one in Anaheim, so it's a great result. To do it in the first of the two games is even better, as it puts the Angels on the back foot for Friday's Dice-K / Santana matchup.

Can't wait for that one. Bring it on.

-----------

Note to any lip-readers out there: although I was able to decipher John Lackey's full-screen "Fuuuuck!!" after being taken out of the game, I couldn't make out what Masterson said to the 2nd base umpire after Ellsbury's catch. Whatever it was, it had them both smiling. If anyone out there can help me, I'd love to hear from you.

Incomplete

2008-09-16T14:12:00.004+02:00

I hate to sit around grumbling after a 13-5, six-HR blowout win in Tampa Bay, but I have a question: am I the only one out there who finds those catwalk home runs extremely frustrating? I know the Sox have been on the wrong end of catwalk plays in the past, so it was nice that Jason Bay's fly ball in the 4th went up there and stayed up there for a home run, but there's just something so incomplete about watching the outfielder look up at the ball in flight but never seeing that ball land.

I'm splitting hairs, but baseball's very nature means that everything tallies up - every run scored is chalked up to an opposing pitcher (or to a fielding error), every error is somebody's fault. When the ball goes up in the air but never comes down, I feel like a little part of the game has gone missing, nudging the baseball universe ever so slightly off-kilter.

---------

Note to the Sox: I have fairly good natural balance, so if you do want to keep pushing things out of whack with more of these home runs over the next couple of days, please feel free to do so - I'll deal with it.

All NESN, all the time

2008-09-12T09:38:00.005+02:00

Good news just in from MLB.com - the MLB.TV subscription is now going to allow users to choose which feed they watch.

First reaction: YEAH!

Second reaction: About bloody time! I never understood why, with all the technical capabilities out there, I was forced to watch the home team feed for every game.

Third reaction: No more Michael Kay / Ken Harrelson / (insert name of crap announcer)!

I'm not going to put all announcers in the same basket. There are some broadcast teams I enjoy listening to - the Orioles, the Tigers (for the genius that is Rod Allen) - but on any given day, I'd rather be listening to NESN - Sox Appeal, RemDawg plugs and all - than any other broadcast team.

Mr....April?

2008-08-27T09:16:00.004+02:00

The box-score says Papelbon (S, 34), but I'm awarding Masterson the save on this one. Bases loaded, one out - two pitches to A-Rod, double play, inning over.

God: the proof

2008-08-21T00:20:00.001+02:00

I hate to rejoice in the misfortune of others, but this is making it hard for me not to.

It ain't over...

2008-08-13T09:42:00.004+02:00

After a week of intermittent baseball-watching (I watched games involving the Cubs, the Astros, the Angels, the Brewers, then lost my Internet connection when I finally had the chance the see some Sox games), I managed to sit down and watch some of the Sox-Rangers games last night. With a work day ahead and 400 miles to drive tonight, I called it a day in the top of the fourth, with the Sox comfortably ahead 12-2. I got up this morning and checked the score, fully expecting to find a tidy 15-4 blowout. of course, after years of watching baseball, I should have known better than to be so naive, but I didn't expect to be this wrong.

The games threw up all kinds of interesting stats, including this little gem:

Texas starter Scott Feldman, who allowed a franchise-record 10 runs in the first inning, became the first big league pitcher to give up at least 12 runs in a game without taking the loss since Gene Packard of the St. Louis Cardinals allowed 12, but won the game over the Philadelphia Phillies, 16-12, on Aug. 3, 1918.

Since I didn't see the whole game, I'll leave the summary to Beth:

9 innings. 36 runs. 3 lead changes. 37 hits. 16 extra-base hits. 4 three run homers - 3 of them by Ortiz and Youkilis, who combined for 11 RBI on the night. 11 pitchers. 400 pitches. And a partridge in a freakin' pear tree.

Out of touch

2008-07-21T21:13:00.001+02:00

When the majority of baseball games are played in the middle of the night, it's very easy to become out of touch with the team you follow. Combine five days away from home, a 4am CET start on the West Coast, a Fox late-nighter and an ESPN midnight start, and you suddenly look up and find you missed the Home Run Derby, the All Star Game and three Sox games in Anaheim.

Given that I don't give a crap about the ASG and that the Sox got swept by the Angels, it's actually probably not a bad time to be away from baseball for a while. However, when these barren periods do occur, I always find myself - whatever the current status of the team - longing to just get back to the game. I love the Red Sox, and I love even more when the Red Sox are doing well, but at times like these, I find myself just longing for the game itself, for the way it reminds us that summer is here and vacation is just around the corner.

Of course, that 'just around the corner' is a problem in itself. Just as I'm getting back into a rhythm which would allow me to devote a little more time to the game, the Sox are on the West Coast and then it's my turn to head out to the West Coast (of France) to charge the batteries. So the Mariners, Yankees, Angels and A's will all have come and gone before I get chance to see another game, but I'm fine with that. All in all, this has been a bit of an off season here in the Desert - dating back to last October - but fortunately the tide is starting to turn. Between now and the end of August, I should be in a position to once again strike the right balance between work and life, and the Sox will be back in their rightful place, somewhere near the top of my day-to-day agenda.

There are others, you know...

2008-07-21T15:05:00.003+02:00

Those with good memories might recall a couple of Bill Bryson posts on here a while back. Well, the man is back with a brief appearance.

I was on the Eurostar to London the weekend before last, and actually had the time and inclination to sit down a read the Sunday Times (a real, get-your-hands-dirty newspaper, like in the good old days), which is where I came across the article in question. However, I think the whole 'reading a newspaper' thing took a toll on my poor old brain: I tore the page out of the paper, tucked it away in my suitcase, took it into the office, scanned it into a JPEG document and was just about to post the image here on the blog when I thought "Hmmmm...maybe it's online in some form or another." And, of course, it is (see the last paragraph).

After years of following the game at a distance, I'm used to having that feeling of vague disconnect combined with immense pleasure, but it's always reassuring to know that you're not alone, and that there are others out there getting excited about being able to turn on the TV and watch a midweek game between the Sox and the Twins.

Snapshot, 3.30am

2008-07-09T10:01:00.005+02:00

"WTF is Manny doing swinging at the first pi... Oh - two-run game-tying homer. Sweet..."

Pinch hits

2008-07-07T12:17:00.004+02:00

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the key word in the term "pinch hitter", "hitter"? Pinch is the situation, but hitting is what you're supposed to be doing.

If that is indeed the case, someone needs to talk to Manny, who came in in the 9th, looked at 3 strikes from Rivera without swinging at a single one and went back to his seat in the dugout. Fellow pinch-hitter Jason Varitek didn't fare much better with his broken-bat grounder to the mound, but at least he took a swing at the damn ball.

The loss wasn't all Manny's (or even Varitek's) fault. They were both aided and abetted by some careless pitching and a bad ricochet, but having stayed up until 5.30am on a workday morning to watch another gift-wrapped Yankees win, I'm not looking to discuss the finer details of the situation. I'm just looking for a scapegoat, and since Manny was apparently "just looking" too, he's it.

Things'll be better later today, I'm sure, but in the meantime, if you need me, I'm the guy sat over there in the corner, quietly fuming.

Turning gold into lead

2008-07-06T10:58:00.003+02:00

Rivera faced four guys in the top of the ninth, giving up the following sequence: single, HBP, RBI single, HBP. Sox down by one, bases loaded, nobody out, and three chances to score. I know how tough the gods of baseball can be, so I wasn't asking for a grand slam. I'd have settled for a sac fly, another HBP, a suicide squeeze, an opposite-field bloop - anything to get at least the tying run home, get Rivera out of the game and maybe have a crack at extra innings. Instead, what we got was the Black Hole of Hitting - Coco, Varitek and Lugo. Strikeout, popup, strikeout - Yankees win.

Next time, I'd like to suggest that Tito just throw in the towel in a situation like that, instead of letting us all sit on the edge of our seats, hoping that maybe, just maybe, this one time, one of those three guys is going to come through in the clutch. I know it's Rivera, and I know there's a reason he's got 466 career saves, but four consecutive guys had got on, and the Sox couldn't get the ball out of the infield. I'm pretty sure that we'd have had a better chance sending my Auntie Hilda up there, and she passed away in '95 (God rest her soul).

Every time these guys come up, I can't help thinking of this theory.

The Sox could send three monkeys up there, and they'd probably have as mch chance of getting that key hit as the guys we're currently using. Wikipedia tells us that the chances of a monkey typing the complete text of Hamlet is approximately one in 3.4 × 10^183,946, which is almost exactly the same as Jason Varitek's current batting average, so the question is: what do we have to lose?

Memo

2008-05-23T12:19:00.003+02:00

To: The Kansas City Royals

Re: Walking Manny to get to Lowell

Plan B needed, guys.

Regards,
Iain

QED

2008-05-14T12:44:00.000+02:00

Further to my thoughts earlier this week on lazy broadcasters, I thought I'd share a gem from the ever-entertaining Fire Joe Morgan. The site is always full of examples of bad sports journalism, but this particular piece gives us a perfect example of the kinds of people who are being paid a shitload of money to watch baseball for a living and share their enlightened thoughts with us poor ignorant fans. In this case, it's the man himself - Joe Morgan:

Charlotte: Joe, you were such a great hitter. What would you do to help Andruw Jones get back on track. He's just lost up there. And I can't believe he's really this bad.

Joe Morgan: I can't either. I can't believe he's having the problems he's having. I have not seen him play this year, as we haven't done a Dodgers' game and he's never int the highlights, so I couldn't give him any specific advice, but I am shocked at how long this slump has extended.

I am officially a broken record, but: Joe Morgan, the #1 analyst on the #1 baseball network in America -- multiple-time Emmy Award Winner -- has not seen a fucking DODGER GAME this year? Not one Dodger game?

I have a full-time job, and a decently complicated life, and a young child. There is not a single team in the majors I haven't watched play this year. I have watched at least one game of every major league team. You know why? I like baseball. Like checking out a Reds-Cubs game on a sleepy Saturday in late April. Like flipping over to a Giants game and imagine what it must be like to be Brian Sabean watching Barry Zito serving 80 MPH cheese to the NL. I like baseball, so I watch baseball. I just...I don't know how saying things like this doesn't get you fired. I really don't.

People wonder why baseball's TV ratings have fallen over recent years. I don't know all the reasons, but I'm willing to bet that having nationally-televised games broadcast by idiots could well be one of them.

I sometime hear players complain about salaries or life on the road or having to live life in the spotlight and think: "Man - stop whining. I'd play for food money," but the reality is that I couldn't, even if you gave me an over-sized glove in center field or asked Livan Hernandez to throw me only 60mph curves at the plate.

Whenever I listen to Joe Morgan, however, I seriously consider drafting a letter to ESPN to ask if they'd like to innovate a little and take a chance on a 38-year-old English color commentator.

(If anyone from ESPN is reading this, I'm available right away, and I'll do the job for free beer and pizza. E-mail me at the address on the right).

Fare thee well

2008-05-13T00:38:00.004+02:00

We'll miss his assorted bouts of wackiness, but before he leaves town for good, I want to give a last tip of the cap to Julian Tavarez.

I thought I might be alone in my wish, but Tito - as ever - has been quick to recognise the invaluable contribution Tavarez made to last year's championship:

"Last year, Julian saved us," Red Sox manager Terry Francona said. "He started for about three months and did a pretty good job."

A 7-11 record and 5.15 ERA might not look like much to write home about, but Tito is right - given the circumstances, Tavarez did a pretty good job. Although he started the year 1-3 (with one no-decision) it's worth pointing out those first 5 games (as a #5 starter) came against Kevin Millwood, Roy Halladay (twice), Chien-Ming Wang and Johan Santana. He came in as a stop-gap, back-of-the-rotation starter, and ended up throwing 134.7 innings over the year (5th most on the team), saving other keys arms from extra wear and tear, keeping the Sox there or thereabouts in the division, and always quick to acknowledge his place in the greater scheme of things.

Wherever he ends up, we wish him all the best.

Manny being...something else?

2008-05-11T11:56:00.003+02:00

During an IM conversation with Beth the other day, we got round to talking about Manny's home run the other day on the very first pitch that the Tigers' Freddy Dolsi ever threw in the major leagues. I said something to the effect that the home run once again proved that Manny was no idiot. He may not have known exactly who Dolsi was - or even that it was his very first major league game - but I'm pretty sure he knew that he'd never seen this guy before and that there was every chance that Dolsi would want to start him off with a first-pitch strike. He did, and Manny hit the ball over the "420'" sign in straight-away center field. As Beth herself said: "Welcome to the bigs, kid, and have a nice day."

My "Manny's no idiot" got us talking about the perception that people have of Manny. There was a time when all you would ever hear were comments about "Manny being Manny", but that point of view - in the Boston media at least - has changed in recent times, and you are at least as likely to read or hear comments and stories about Manny's work-ethic and his game preparation as you are about him selling a grill on eBay or attending a custom car auction. Maybe this change in perception has something to do with the fact that, over the past few seasons, Manny has been far more accessible and open to the media than he had been previously. With no access to what Manny himself had to say about things on the field, all the media had to go on were his off-field idiosyncrasies. Now that Manny is talking more, suddenly everyone is underlining all that's good about Manny: what a smart hitter he is, how well he prepares for games, how he will sit on a pitch for as long as it takes to get it, etc.

Beth's reaction to my comments about Manny's baseball smarts was: "but I guess you're preaching to the choir there, 'cos I figured everbody realized he did stuff like that." On evidence you'd have no reason to think otherwise, but if you are following the Red Sox from somewhere other than New England, it ain't necessarily so.

I know that Red Sox Nation extends around the world (62 countries is the latest official count), but I'm guessing that the majority of the Nation is getting its coverage from within the boundaries of New England, with TV coverage almost exclusively by NESN. This means that there are a bunch of people of this planet who have the enormous good fortune to be able to tune in to Don and Jerry about 150 times a year. A normal state of affairs, you might think, and so it is. But what it also means is that those same people are seeing the Red Sox through rose- (red-?)tinted spectacles - they're getting the full picture. However, that other groups of fans - those of us who live outside New England - are forced to get our Sox coverage any which way we can, which for many means MLB.com / MLB.TV.

"Forced" sounds a little harsh - I should clarify. For international fans, MLB.TV is the best thing ever, and my own love of the service, and of baseball on the Internet in general, has been well documented on this very website. It is a lifeline without which my love of the game might well have slowly faded and died. However, if you're not a generic 'fan of the game', but a fan of a specific team, you are subjected to MLB.TV's choice of feed. As far as I can gather, the general rule seems to be that they show the home team's feed, meaning that I get NESN for 81 games a year, and for the other 81 I watch that old favourite WEIOT (Whatever Else Is Out There).

Most of the time, watching the other team's feed depresses me. I hate to be an unabashed homer, but there really is no other broadcast team I would rather hear than Don & Jerry. However, there are times when watching all those other feeds gives me a unique insight into the Red Sox, not in terms of learning things that haven't already been covered by the Boston media (and IMHO, if it ain't been covered by the Boston media, it probably ain't worth covering), but in terms of realising how the Sox are presented outside the New England area.

Which brings me back to Manny. Whilst most of Red Sox Nation is now exposed to fairly balanced coverage of Manny, fans of other teams continue to get the unbalanced, shorthand version night after night. This thought has occurred to me on several occasions, as I've heard announcers just trotting out the old "Manny being Manny" line, instead of trying to come up with something new and/or intelligent to say. If you've ever listened to Tim McCarver broadcast a game on FOX, then you can imagine the kind of thing I'm talking about: Manny botches a catch in left field, and instead of, say, putting it into context and stacking it up against the outfield assists he makes in a season - basically, anything that would enlighten us on some aspect of the game - we get "there's Manny being Manny", along with a knowing chuckle, as though 1) this explained anything at all, and 2) he were the first person on the planet to ever think of using the phrase.

This type of broadcsting shorthand annoys me on a number of levels, the first one being that it's an insult to the the intelligence of fans watching the game. You can no more generalise about the 'average baseball fan' than you can about the 'average coffee-drinker', but I would venture to suggest that if somebody has decided to sit in front of their TV for at least 3 hours to watch a game, then they are at least moderately interested in what's going on. Not every person watching a game is a fan of stats or long-winded technical explanations, but I do think that most fans would appreciate a little real insight into the game, rather than observations which basically mean nothing more than "Manny is a space cadet" and which add zero value to the broadcast. I remember when Manny first had the wild hair going, and it was the same. Up at the plate, one of the greatest right-handed hitters in the game, a genius with a bat in his hand, and all we'd hear was announcers going on and on about his hair. Well, gee thanks, much obliged to y'all for adding such insightful commentary and increasing my enjoyment of the game.

I'm not that demanding a fan, but, to be honest, I do want more from my announcers than that. This style of announcing gets to me first and foremost because it's just damn lazy. We live in an age where anybody with a computer and two functioning index fingers can access pretty much any stat they want. On that basis alone I sometimes sit there and wonder if I couldn't do a better job of announcing than some of the crews out there. It's human nature to want to pigeonhole people and hang easy-to-identify labels on them, but baseball announcers see - what? - two or three out-of-town teams a week, and maybe twenty over the course of a six-month season. How hard can it be to put in some time really researching the other teams, rather than mailing in the "Manny being Manny" line (which, by the way, we've been getting for several years now, meaning it's both lazy and old news).

Beyond the stats, these guys have access to the players that we the fans can only dream about, and I would really like them to put that access to good use in their presentation of the game. Many of the announcers are former players, so when they get a chance to talk to players from opposing teams, I'd really appreciate them using their experience of the game to ask the relevant questions and present the answers within the context of the game. There are broadcast teams out there who manage to do that, so I know it's possible, but they seem to be the exception rather than the rule.

One thing that occurred to me whilst writing this is that I haven't really given NESN much thought in my musings on the subject. At the risk of sounding like a homer, my gut response would be that the NESN crew is less guilty of using this kind of shorthand, but that may well be because I'm not paying all that much attention. Not that I'm not listening, but Don and Jerry bring a lot of things to the table which increase my enjoyment of the game. They let rip with outrageous stuff when it's the right time to do so, but I find them to be well focused on the game unfolding in front of them. They know that, ultimately, we're here for the game, not for Don and Jerry.

As far as NESN goes, my view of their capabilities is coloured by the fact that I'm filling in any potential gaps in the information chain myself, with things I have learned from watching games broadcast by other networks. At the end of the day this is what frustrates me the most with the majority of broadcast teams: they can and do give insightful information on the home-team players, but seem incapable of putting in the same effort with visiting teams.

So, gentlemen of the broadcasting profession, the gauntlet is laid down. Feel free to pick it up and surprise me with something new.

Trade-off

2008-05-09T08:58:00.000+02:00

I'm not going to complain about a day off work yesterday (spent at the beach), but getting back late did mean that I unfortunately missed watch last night's performance of "Take Your Broken-Bat Bloop Single Walk-Off Win And Shove It Where The Sun Don't Shine" by Commander Kickass of the F@#k Yeah Brigade (© Surviving Grady): 7 innings, 1 earned run, 8 strikeouts (including career #1000) and a win.

The Sox are now 23-14, good for first place in the division and the best record in the American League. If that doesn't take the edge off having to go into work today when the world and his wife seem to have taken a long weekend, then I don't know what will.

Go figure

2008-05-07T07:42:00.002+02:00

So, let me get this straight: Daisuke - throwing regular, (theoretically) controllable pitches - walks eight batters in 5 innings; Tim Wakefield - throwing the notoriously enigmatic knuckleball - walks not a single guy over 8 innings in last night's win?

The more I watch the game of baseball, the less I understand it.

---------------

Fact of the day from the Globe:

Research by the Elias Sports Bureau indicates that last night marked the first time since 1900 a team pitched a shutout using multiple pitchers all over the age of 40.

Totally useless, but pretty cool, if you're a baseball geek like me.

Reverse mojo

2008-05-06T07:03:00.005+02:00

It was late, so I may be mistaken in this, but if I remember rightly the ESPN crew last night came up with these two classic bits of sports broadcasting:

Situation: 2nd inning, Mike Lowell at the plate.
Quote: "Lowell, just back from injury, had 120 RBIs last season. So far this year, he has none."
Result: Two-run home run.

Situation: 4th inning, Kevin Youkilis at the plate.
Quote: "Youkilis is 0-for-6 lifetime against Bonderman."
Result: Two-run home run.

An impressive 2-for-2 on the night. I think NESN should hire these guys as a backup broadcast team. When the going gets tough, they could bring them in for a batter - pinch-hitting, SWAT-style, for Don and Jerry - to get those crucial runs on the board.

Change of speed

2008-05-05T21:26:00.003+02:00

I don't know where the days and weeks go, but they seem to be going there at a hell of a lick right now. I looked at the calendar this weekend and suddenly realised we are already into the month of May.

That realisation had me thinking back to this time last year, when I was preparing to go back to Boston on my second Fenway pilgrimage. That in turn brought on an acute bout of baseball depression, since I won't be going anywhere near the Commonwealth of Massachusetts anytime soon, so I thought I'd try to cheer myself up by reading over some of the posts and reliving some of the magical moments from that homestand.

As I started to look over the posts from last May's trip, it struck me that my whole baseball rhythm has altered dramatically over the course of the past twelve months. I already knew it had done, because the new job has been such a drain on the time and energy I have available to devote to the game, but it was only when looking over those posts that I realised to what extent. By May 5th of last year, I had already watched 26 Red Sox games. (Not just highlights, but 26 complete games. If you need a yardstick, the Sox had played 29 games at that point. 'Obsession' doesn't even come close...). This year, what with work, vacation and my broadband connection having bad hair days (always on Sunday evenings, when I have the time to watch the game) if I've seen 10 games, that would be about it.

I'm not trying to win any prizes, so the number itself is not a problem, but I will say this: I miss those damn games, even if for the most part they left me feeling tired the next morning. I have a good, comfortable life that I am happy with, but nothing in that life gives me the same sense of belonging that watching the Red Sox does. It doesn't matter that I'm half a world away from the action, or that the games begin in the middle of the night. If anything, those things just make the feeling of belonging all that more intense, since differences in geography and time zones are erased by the simple fact of rooting for the same team.

I still feel connected to the Sox, but if I could have a wish for the rest of the season, it would be to rediscover the time and energy that would allow me once more to become a full-time member of Red Sox Nation.

Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Just-in-time management

2008-04-20T14:20:00.005+02:00

My internal alarm-clock didn't go off last night, so I didn't join the game until about 3:30 CET. It was already the bottom of the 7th inning, and the Sox were down 3-2. I almost didn't hang in there, but I was awake and unlikely to drop back off to sleep, so I figured what the hell...

One inning later, Papi tied the game and Manny worked yet more of his unbelievable early-season magic.

(photo: AP)

In any other situation, a quote like this:

"[Ortiz is] going to come through," said Ramirez. "If he doesn't hit, I'm going to come through for him,"

would just sound like a player trying his hardest to support a struggling teammate, but looking at what Manny has done this past week, you can't help wondering if he hasn't slipped through a crack into some strange, parallel superhero universe where he is actually trying to do this...and succeeding. A bad man indeed.

----------------------------

Whilst Manny's game-winning blast is quite rightly going to get all the headlines, the former center-fielder in me would like to say that without Jacoby Ellsbury's running catch in the top of the 8th, the Sox wouldn't have been in a position to win the game at all. So consider it said.

----------------------------

Stat of the game: thanks to baseball's sometimes bizarre accounting system, Ellsbury's catch allowed Javier Lopez to record the win with the sum total of one pitch. I don't care where you work - that's a pretty efficient day at the office.

Old friends

2008-04-19T14:18:00.002+02:00

So far this season, I've seen bits of different games at different times of the day, but for the first time this season, there was my favourite middle-of-the-night gathering chez Iain, with the best guest-list that an MLB.TV subscription can buy: me, Don and Jerry and the Red Sox.

When you get up at 1am to watch the game - especially on a Friday night after a tough week at work - things can get a little shaky around the 3rd or 4th inning, as you fight to stay awake. Last night was no exception. The evening was slow in getting going, and with Daisuke looking like he needed a map to find the strike zone, it seemed like we were in for a looooong night. What I hadn't counted on was the proceedings being considerably enlivened by the arrival of an unexpected old friend from seasons past: Big Papi - he of the monstrous bat, the 5 RBIs and the grand slam home run.

It's amazing what four runs in the 3rd and five runs in the 4th (including four from the Sox' Young Guns: Lowrie, Ellsbury and Pedroia) will do for your stamina. I went from almost asleep to full fist-pumping mode in the space of about 20 minutes, and that rush of energy kept me going from Daisuke's exit in the sixth right through to Timlin's 1-2-3 ninth. (I'll repeat that again, just for Beth's benefit: Timlin's 1-2-3 ninth...).

The Sox are a long way from perfect, but taking into account the Japan trip, the absence of Lowell, and the pale imitation of Big Papi that we saw up until last night, records of 7-3 over their last ten games and 11-7 overall seem pretty good to me. Now would be a perfect time to build on that at Fenway and put together a nice little winning streak between now and the end of the month.

Over to you, gents...

Stop, start

2008-04-13T15:49:00.002+02:00

One of the things that has always drawn me to baseball is that it's a game of discontinuous action. I grew up watching soccer and cricket, and although I spent more time watching the former than I did the latter, I think that cricket always appealed to me more because of those constant breaks in the action. Soccer has its breaks too, but they're much shorter, and the game itself flows - and time passes - much quicker. Cricket, on the other hand, is a game where there is a break between every delivery, giving the players, the spectators and the broadcast teams time to take a step back and place everything back in the bigger picture.

Baseball is exactly the same kind of game. Despite it being an incredibly physical game, those bursts of action are quite widely spaced, and the time between each pitch, each at-bat and each inning is time which all of us can use to look back at what has just happened and look forward to what is about to happen.

If you watch any baseball game closely enough, you end up noticing that there are actually countless moments when time seems to just stop. The same kind of thing happens in other 'bat & ball' sports – tennis and golf are the ones which spring to mind – where there's a split-second before the action where everything seems to be in suspended animation, and there's an overwhelming sense of a huge wave of energy about to be unleashed. The tennis player comes to a stop just before the ball is thrown up in the air for the service; the golfer stops for a second just before starting the backswing; the baseball diamond is frozen in time just before the pitcher goes into his wind-up. Once that moment is over, there's a flurry of action as the ball heads towards the opposing player, the green or the plate, but it is that moment which appeals so much to me as a fan. In the minutes and seconds leading up to it, we can see all the potential outcomes of the situation, and chances are that we're probably praying for one or more of them at any given time (strike, strikeout, ground ball, double play, sac fly, home run). As time stops for a moment, the play and the game are ours to imagine as we see fit, but once that split-second is over, the game is once more beyond our grasp and in the hands of the guys on the field.

Last night's game saw one of those moments taken to the nth degree: one-run Sox lead in the top of the 8th, two on and two out for the Yankees, A-Rod at the plate. Messrs Buck and McCarver – Fox's resident specialists in "stating the blindingly obvious" – pointed out that this was the ballgame right here. Tito clearly felt the same way, and he summoned Papelbon from the bullpen to put an end to the foolishness. However, thanks to the vagaries of Massachusetts weather, the key moment of the game was suspended for much longer than a mere split-second. The rain came down before Papelbon could throw a single pitch, and he had to wait 2 hours and 11 minutes before he could get back out there and face A-Rod. (Question, did the baseball gods do that on purpose, thinking, "Shit, we can't have a Sox-Yankees game that lasts under three hours – let's send 'em some rain"?) Those 131 minutes were enough to allow the following to happen: the tarp to be put on the field; the tarp to be pulled off the field and put back on again; Papelbon to warm up on three separate occasions; Fox to show the end of the D-Backs / Rockies game and yet more inane banter (this time courtesy of Zelasko, Karros and Kennedy); my cable channel to decide to switch to the Bruins game; and, finally, me to go to bed.

So, in the end, the 2 hours and 11 minutes on the East Coast translated into something like nine hours over here, as I was only able to catch up with the 8th and 9th innings of the game over breakfast today. Leaving the game hanging in the balance like that didn't stop me getting a good night's sleep, but there was definitely a sense of unfinished business and a rush to switch on the condensed game this morning. I deliberately picked it up again right where I'd left off, and was rewarded with a three-pitch strikeout of A-Rod and a 1-2-3 ninth.

I wouldn't want all those key moments to be as long in coming, but now and again they really are worth the wait. And in the end I woke up to a win, so my day was made before it even really got started; anything else from here on in will just be icing on the cake.

Opening Day, SG style

2008-04-08T17:02:00.002+02:00

I'm pretty pumped about Opening Day at Fenway, but unfortunately have no time to put my thoughts to paper, or rather, to keyboard.

What I can do, though, is give you a glimpse into the amazing place that is Red's brain, for Opening Day à la Surviving Grady.

During the seventh inning stretch, Neil Diamond sprints from the bullpen to sing "Sweet Caroline," but is intercepted and dropkicked by Mike Timlin, allowing Tom Waits to bust with "The Heart of Saturday Night" with, inexplicably, Kevin Millar on bass.

Will somebody please put this man in charge of the festivities, NOW?

A lucrative sideline

2008-04-08T15:04:00.003+02:00

This year we negotiated the amount of bling with David and we compromised.

David Ortiz: baseball superstar and bling consultant.

Opening Day, Part x

2008-04-02T21:04:00.002+02:00

Last Tuesday there was Opening Day in Japan. Last night there was Opening Day in Oakland. Next week it'll be Opening Day at Fenway Park. But tonight, it's the best Opening Day of all: whilst most of Red Sox Nation is cursing a 3:35pm start or having to urgently rush home from work to look after poor Auntie Ethel, who is once again - unbelievably - at death's door, I'm rubbing my hands together at the prospect of the first game of the year here in the Baseball Desert.

Beer? Check.
Pringles? Check.
Baseball? You bet your ass.

Play ball!

Welcome to my life

2008-03-26T08:37:00.003+01:00

As suspected, a start-time of 11:05am CET didn't actually work out too well for me. During my lunch hour I managed to catch the radio broadcast of the last inning-and-a-half (speaking of which, a question for Papelbon: "WTF??!!"), and then I saw some of the condensed game last night on NASN (only some, because my meeting went on for, erm, THREE-AND-A-HALF HOURS!), but it wasn't quite the Opening Day experience I would have hoped.

However, without wishing to gloat or to set myself on some kind of pedestal, I have to admit that some of the articles and blog posts about yesterday's game, which make a lot of the fact that the game began at the unearthly hour of 6:05am ET, have provoked a wry smile or two here in the Desert. The comments are fair enough, because that's a pretty early Monday morning kick-off, and it's slap bang in the middle of the time people are getting ready for work, commuting etc., but there is a part of me that just wants to say: "Welcome to my life, Red Sox Nation."

Outside of weekend day games, that is pretty much how I watch the Red Sox all season long. In fact, 6:05am would actually be an improvement on the start-times I generally have, which are: 1:05am, 2:05am and the ultimate Iain-killers, those 4:05am West Coast games. I know that 95% of Red Sox Nation is able to switch on the TV at 7:05pm and watch the games on NESN or ESPN, but it's nice to know that people occasionally get a glimpse of what it's like for us poor bastards who don't live in the U.S. and for whom watching the Red Sox really does mean putting in a lot of unsocial hours.

When the Sox won it all in '04, I felt a little bit guilty that I didn't have all those years of suffering stowed away in my Sox account, but I took - and still take - some comfort from the fact that I do 'suffer' for my team in the here and now, putting in some David Eckstein-style gritty performances just to get through the games in one piece.

So when you get up this morning at the crack of dawn to watch Game 2, remember those of us who live in baseball deserts across the world, and raise a glass to us next time you come home from work at 7, switch on the TV and hear Carl Beane utter the magical phrase: "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to Fenway Park."

Today: now officially a good day

2008-03-25T14:59:00.005+01:00

Manny is still Manny, wherever the game is played:

OK, I'm ready - bring on that meeting...

Opening Morning

2008-03-24T21:06:00.008+01:00

"The game could be played in the middle of the night. They don't care. They want to watch the Red Sox. We're used to that. We have the most passionate fans in the world."

Not-so-breaking news: if you're in the Baseball Desert, they're pretty much all in the middle of the night. And Tito's right - I don't care, because I want to see the Sox play. Of course, the one time Opening Day is at a reasonable hour of the day (11:05am), I have a huge meeting to prepare and probably won't even be able to sneak a look on MLB.TV.

I guess it figures. It's possibly some kind of revenge by the baseball gods for me having forsaken all things Red Sox pretty much since they clinched the World Series back in October. I didn't see the parade, I haven't followed much of what's been going on, and if I saw three innings of Spring Training, that would be about it.

The upside of all that is that I'm ready to go. I may not be in front of my PC tomorrow, but I'll be with the Sox in spirit, cheering them quietly behind my desk, keeping the emotions buried just below the surface until they can be released in the coming days, at home, in front of the TV, with beer firmly in hand.

Of course, I'm looking at Opening Day through Red Sox-tinted glasses, but it's a day that is cherished by fans of all teams, wherever they may be. And beyond the specific hopes of a championship or a winning season or a finish in some place other than last, there is that simple, shared feeling that it's great to see baseball back in our lives.

It's not a perfect game - and in case those who may wax a little too lyrical at times (e.g. me) need reminding, it never really has been - but it's our game, something we can count on day in and day out for the next seven months. Come rain or shine, every team will play its quota of 162 games, and come late October, someone will be wearing a shit-eating, "Oh my God we did it" expression and trying to defy gravity.

There'll only be one team wearing that expression at the end of the season, one team that arrives at that magical destination, but part of the joy of baseball is that, in some respects, the journey is the destination.

Whilst Red is going with James Earl Jones, I'm going with Thomas Boswell, who express it better than I ever could. I make no apologies for quoting this passage again, because although the names may have changed over the past two-and-a-half decades, the possibility of those "oceans of consolation" remains.

Thomas Boswell: Why Time Begins On Opening Day (1984)

Why baseball?

Millions of us have wondered. How can baseball maintain such a resolute grasp on us? My own affection for the game has held steady for decades, maybe even grown with age. After twenty-five years of attachment, I have no sense of wanting to be weaned from this habit. What seems most strange is the way so many of us reserve a protected portion of our lives for a game which often seems like an interloper among our first-rate passions. What is baseball doing here, tucked on the same high shelf with our most entrenched emotions?

If asked where baseball stood amid such notions as country, family, love, honor, art and religion, we might say derisively, “Just a game.” But, under oath, I'd abandon some of these Big Six before I'd give up baseball. Clearly, a game which becomes one of our basic fidelities is something more than “sport.” Perhaps the proper analogy is to our other joyous, inexplicable addictions.

A thread runs through all these idle loves. Each, like baseball, brings us into a small and manageable world chocked with intriguing and unambiguous details; we are beckoned into tiny universes where the areas of certainty are large, where the regions of doubt are pleasantly small. The cook must wrestle with tarragon and basil, the gardener agonizes over his pruning. The baseball fan knows every batting average, down to the thousandth of a point. What steady ground on which to stand, if only in one corner of our lives! Each pastime has its own unstated set of values. That part of us which is a fly fisher or a curer of hams or an habitué of the bleachers shares fragments of a common viewpoint with others of the same tastes.

When we meet a bona fide fan – and baseball fanciers can be as snobbish as wine sippers or prize rose gardeners – we start from an assumption of kinship. Implicit is the sense that you endorse a whole range of civilized modern tastes; if you'd lived in the sixteenth century, you would probably have liked Montaigne. By and large, baseball fans tend to prefer pastoral, slyly anecdotal, proven-if-slightly-dated things over those which are urban or pretentious or trendy. We choose the gentle grandstand conversations, beer in hand, on a soft spring night over the raucous forty-yard-line scream, whiskey-in-fist, on a brisk autumn afternoon. Our presumption of comradeship is considerable. Anyone who shares our range of wise opinion must do dastardly deeds to lose our good will.

In sum, what baseball provides is fact. Fact in a butter sauce of tone. Fact as in the sense of detail and correctness. Tone as in style and spirit.

In contrast to the unwieldy world which we hold in common, baseball offers a kingdom built to human scale. Its problems and questions are exactly our size. Here we may come when we feel a need for a rooted point of reference. In much the same way, we take a long hike or look for hard work when we suspect what's bothering us is either too foolish or too serious to permit a solution.

Baseball isn't necessarily an escape from reality, though it can be; it is merely one of our refuges within the real where we try to create a sense of order on our own terms. Born to an age where horror has become commonplace, where tragedy has, by its monotonous repetition, become a parody of sorrow, we need to fence off a few parks where humans try to be fair, where skill has some hope of reward, where absurdity has a harder time than usual getting a ticket.

In those moments when we have had our bellyful of abstractions, it is detail, the richness of the particular, which restores us to ourselves. There are oceans of consolation, seas of restored appetite, in as humble a thing as a baseball season. This great therapeutic wash of fact and anecdote draws us back to ourselves when we catch ourselves, like Ishmael, water-gazing too long.

[...]

Baseball offers us pleasure and insight at so many levels and in so many forms that, when we try to grasp the who sport in our two hands, we end up with nothing. The game, because it is no one thing but, rather, dozens of things, has slipped through our fingers again.

As each season begins, we always feel the desire to capsulize and define the source of the sharp anticipation that we feel as opening day approaches. We know that something fine, almost wonderful, is about to begin, but we can't quite say why baseball seems so valuable, almost indispensable, to us. The game, which remains one of our broadest sources of metaphor, changes with our angle of vision, our mood; there seems to be no end to our succession of lucky discoveries.

When opening day arrives, think how many baseball worlds begin revolving for seven months.

As history, baseball has given us an annual chapter each year since 1869. Each team will add a page to its franchise's epic. Countless questions that attach themselves to the baseball continuum will be answered. Will Pete Rose find a way to break Ty Cobb's record for hits? Will Reggie Jackson get his five hundredth home run? Will Terry Felton – oh-for-sixteen in his career and back in the minors again – ever win a game? Yes, we walk with giants.

As living theatre and physical poetry, the game will be available in twenty-six ballparks on more than two thousand occasions. Baseball is always there when we want it – seven days a week, seven months a year. All the tactile pleasures of the park are ready, when the proper mood strikes us: evening twilights, sundowns, hot summer Sunday afternoons, the cool of the dark late innings of night games, quiet drives home as we decompress and digest.

Then, just when we think the game is essentially mellow and reflective, we find ourselves looped in the twists and coils of a 5-4 barn burner between two contenders. When the centerfielder jumps above the fence in the bottom of the ninth and comes down with the ball and the game in his hand, we realize that two or three hours is just the proper amount of time to tighten the mainspring of tension before letting us explode in one, final cheer. We leave with a glowing tiredness, delighted by the memories of this impromptu and virile ballet, all choreographed by the capricious flight of a ball.

Despite all this, baseball may give us more pleasure, more gentle, unobtrusive sustenance, away from the park than it does inside it.

With breakfast, we have our ten minutes of box scores – enough to travel to thirteen cities, see thirteen games in our mind's eye, note at a glance what five hundred players did or failed to do. Dave Righetti, five walks in four innings, still can't get his delivery in synch. Tony Armas, three for four, out of his latest slump, will probably go right into a streak and hit five homers by next Friday.

On Sunday, the breakfast process takes an extra ten minutes, since The Averages must be consumed. We imagine the state of mind of dozens of players and their teammates. (Who ever thought that Seaver had another good season in him? Kingman's down to .196; bet that bum's a prince to be around.)

Then, in odd parts of the day, the game drifts into the mind. Who's pitching tonight? Is it on TV? At worst, the home team is on the radio; catch the last few innings. “Double-play grounder to Ozzie Smith deep in the hole, Billy Russell's chugging toward first, Steve Sax trying to take out Tommy Herr.”

Why, it doesn't even have to happen to be real.

The ways that baseball insinuates itself into the empty corners, cheering up the odd hour, are almost too ingrained to notice. Tape at eleven, the scores before bed, the Monday and Saturday games of the week. Into how many conversations will Steinbrenner's name creep, so that we may gauge the judgements of our friends, catch a glimpse of their values on the sly? The amateur statistician and the armchair strategist in us is roused. What fan doesn't have a new system for grading relief pitchers, or a theory on why the Expos never win?

Sure, opening day is baseball's bandwagon. Pundits and politicians and every prose poet on the continent jumps on board for a few days. But they're gone soon, off in search of some other windy event worthy of their attention. Then, once more, all those long, slow months of baseball are left to us. And our time can begin again.

Great minds think alike...

2008-02-12T15:13:00.000+01:00

...but not always at the same speed.

About two seconds before I clicked on Call of the Green Monster's RSS feed, I had an idea about a blog post on PEDs and Roger Clemens's dog.

Of course, COTGM beat me to it.

Nothing to see here, people...keep movin'

2008-01-29T23:15:00.000+01:00

If this turns out to be true, all I can say is: thank fuck for that. Maybe now we can all get on with our lives again, and get back to thinking about the serious stuff, like how it's only 15 days, 18 hours and 45 minutes until Pitchers & Catchers?

Winter signing

2007-12-21T10:09:00.000+01:00

I took delivery of a brand-new, Santa-Claus-red, #34 Red Sox jersey this week, and before letting a silly grin break out all over my face, I wanted to check whether it was the right size.

Having erred very much on the side of caution, the jersey was not just big, but big enough to slip over the shirt and tie I was still wearing after work. As I put the jersey on, I was suddenly reminded of those bizarre moments baseball fans see every winter, where new free agents put the new jersey on over the top of their press conference suit and tie.

It was too surreal a moment for it not to be captured for posterity. So, thanks to Mrs. Iain, The Baseball Desert is proud to present an exclusive shot of the new addition to the Red Sox rotation. (Note: I was trying for a Papelbon stare, but came up somewhat short...):

"Johan who?"

---------------

In other news, The Baseball Desert is heading off to the UK for the holidays, so it will be even quieter than usual around here over the next ten days or so. Before I go, I'd like to wish all those reading this blog - whether for the 1st or the 500th time - all the very best for the holiday season. Wherever you are and whatever you celebrate, have a good one.

I leave you with the traditional end-of-year Baseball Desert wish:

Peace on earth, goodwill toward men, and another championship for the Boston Red Sox.

The only sane response

2007-12-15T14:30:00.000+01:00

This whole steroids / PEDs / Mitchell Report thing is one of those situations so depressing that it calls for a radical solution. With that in mind I give you Yanksfan vs. Soxfan's proposal: asterisks...

Virtual baseball

2007-12-08T23:25:00.000+01:00

It hadn't struck me until I checked various blog feeds a few minutes ago that today was the day selected single-game Sox tickets go on sale. Over the past couple of years, this has been a day of much rejoicing here in the Desert, but this time around, real life has placed itself firmly in the way of any plans to make a third consecutive pilgrimage to Fenway.

With the recent change in my job situation I knew that a trip in 2008 was very unlikely, but now that the best opportunity to get tickets for games has passed me by, I'm starting to realise that there'll be no Mother's Day Miracle for me next season, no beers with fellow Sox fans, no hanging around the players' entrance trying to will the evening to go on forever. Damn.

I know there's a lot of far more important shit going on in the world right now, but I need a little pick-me-up, so I'm going to stick Faith Rewarded in the DVD player, pour myself a beer and raise a toast to friends and fellow Red Sox fans 4,000 miles away:

The body will unfortunately be staying in Paris next season, but I'll be with y'all in spirit. GO SOX!

Moral dilemma

2007-12-04T23:48:00.001+01:00

Question: does going all don't-do-it-Theo crazy when Jacoby Ellsbury is mentioned in any potential trade for Johan Santana whilst at the same time being totally okay with the Sox maybe trading away Jon Lester - cancer survivor, World Series Game 4 winner and all-round baseball hero - make me a bad person?

I worry...

Update: Schilling has an excellent take on the situation, looking at the two sides ofthe question: baseball as a business vs. these guys are my teammates. None of us know what's going to happen in the next few days, but in light of that, Schilling's conclusion is not a bad one:

If it doesn’t happen then we go about trying to win another World Championship with a roster that’s already proven it can do it. That isn’t a bad ‘fall back’ position.

Either way 4-6 players lives will most likely change forever in the next 24-48 hours, and it’ll be good for baseball and good for the teams involved. So I hope it’s us, but I’m more than ok if it’s not.

Baseball, old-school

2007-11-30T14:30:00.000+01:00

I took a day off work this week to spend some time with my youngest daughter. When asked what she wanted to do she chose - out of all the possibilities that Paris offers - a visit to the Louvre. (To be fair, she has a fascination with all things Egyptian, and wanted to see some tombs and mummies and stuff, so the Louvre was the best place for that. And at least she didn't say she wanted to go see a movie with some talking animals, which was a huge relief to me.)

To get to the Egyptian section, you have to go through the Greek sculptures, and as we did so, my daughter grabbed my sleeve and said: "Papa! Regarde - un baseballeur!"

And sure enough, there indeed was the spitten image of a Kevin Youkilis from centuries ago, right down to the scary facial hair:

Given the hefty, Pedroia-like hack he looks to be launching, this guy is clearly not the Greek God of Walks, but if the Celestial All-Stars are ever in the market for a cleanup hitter, they could do worse than give this guy a tryout.

Thank you and goodnight

2007-10-29T05:44:00.000+01:00

Damn - baseball is over for another year. But here are three little words to keep us warm over the winter:

World. Series. Champions.

Enjoy...

Dr Feelgood?!

2007-10-28T19:52:00.000+01:00

People, beware - the world is about to end. I read Shaughnessy's column today, and it actually gave me goosebumps:

The Globe's Gordon Edes had an interesting conversation with [Tim] Wakefield last week on the day it was announced the knuckleballer would not be on the World Series roster. "Maybe there's a reason for it," Wakefield told Edes. "Maybe it's Jonny Lester's time to shine."

It's Wakefield's quote (and Timmy, just so you know: we love you) but props to Shaughnessy for highlighting it today. I hate to admit it, but it was the perfect quote at the perfect moment.

Rookies vs. Rockies

2007-10-28T19:09:00.000+01:00

Dear Daisuke, Dustin and Jacoby,

Welcome to the big leagues. We hope you stay there for years to come.

Yours admiringly,
Red Sox Nation

---------------

There's a lot of Jacoby love going around right now, and rightly so. Seeing him become only the third rookie ever to get four hits in a World Series game, it's easy to forget that he began the season in AA.

And above and beyond that bit of awesomeness, there's that polite, wholesome, baseball-poster-boy side to him, which has got Kristen wondering:

True or false: Every time Tito gave Ellsbury a start during the season, he found a nice note written on sturdy stationary in his manager's office the next day?

Thanks for giving me a shot. I hope to make you proud.

Signed,
Jacoby Ellsbury
(Centerfielder, Boston Red Sox)

Eventually, Tito had to tell him nicely to stop since it was appreciated but really wasn't necessary. "Kid, you're gonna get a lot of starts in the future. You don't want to spend all your time writing notes." But Ellsbury just wanted Tito to know how appreciative he was. He's thinking maybe a nice fruit basket, or perhaps a wine and cheese assortment to thank Tito after the season is over. Mike Lowell can totally help him pick out something appropriate.

The day was already good, but it just got ten times funnier...

Happy Holliday!

2007-10-26T09:06:00.000+02:00

Dear Matt,

Welcome to the big leagues:

(photo: Getty Images)

Yours sincerely,
Jonathan Papelbon & Kevin Youkilis

The next level

2007-10-25T08:04:00.000+02:00

Dear Colorado Rockies,

Welcome to the big leagues.

Yours sincerely,
The Boston Red Sox

Rip Van Winkle

2007-10-24T17:04:00.000+02:00

As far as baseball goes, I feel like I've been asleep for the best part of six weeks and I've just woken up to find that Game 1 of the World Series is being played tonight at Fenway Park.

I haven't really had time to get excited about this, but I just had a wander over to the Globe website, which is full of pre-Series photos like these:

(photo: AP)

and I'd like to make the following official Baseball Desert statement:

OH MY GOD - GAME 1 OF THE WORLD SERIES TONIGHT AT FENWAY PARK!!!

*Jumps up and down discretely in his office chair.*

I'm worn out and need a good eight hours' sleep several nights in a row, but I wouldn't miss Beckett in Game 1 for anything, so I'll be there, cap on head and beer (or maybe coffee) in hand, rooting for the hometown whites.

Go Sox!

Letter to Schill

2007-10-20T10:21:00.000+02:00

Dear Curt,

I didn't really know in advance how this whole ALCS thing was going to pan out, so I'm unfortunately going to be far from my TV / PC when you take the mound tonight. But I do vaguely remember an ALCS Game 6, with the Sox down 3-2, not that long ago which turned out pretty well for the Sox, and a little bit more of that postseason magic would go down a treat.

Thanks in advance.
Iain

One step at a time

2007-10-18T14:47:00.001+02:00

(photo: Boston Globe)

The cloud: win tonight, or hit the golf course tomorrow.

The silver lining: Josh isn't a golf kinda guy, so he'd like to keep this baseball thing going for a little while longer, thank you very much...

Raise Your Hand

2007-10-06T23:36:00.000+02:00

As expected, real life - tying up the loose ends at the old job and jumping in at the deep end and trying to swim in the new one - had pushed baseball out of the frame these past two weeks. All I managed to see were parts of a couple of games, and the end of the regular season was pretty much experienced second-hand, via the keyboards Red Sox Nation.

Despite being dead tired (I'd forgotten that this 'work' thing could be so exhausting), I've decided that I'll try to see as much of the playoffs as possible. The results so far are:

A complete game shutout by Josh Beckett
A two-out, bottom-of-the-ninth walk-off win, courtesy of Manny

Talk about coming back just in time...

Whereas Wednesday's game never looked in doubt, last night's game (which finished at the distinctly fan-unfriendly time of 6:50am here on the Old Continent) was one of those Red Sox classics which have you tearing your hair out by the third inning, biting your nails by the sixth and jumping on the sofa by the bottom of the ninth.

The two-run lead was a nice way to get things going, but when Daisuke gave it back almost immediately - with interest - it looked like it was going to be one of those nights. Despite clawing a run back and throwing the best of the bullpen at the Angels, it still looked like it was going to be one of those nights, even going into the ninth. With Manny up at the plate and two men on, I was sure that we were going to get one of his patented picture-perfect-but-six-inches-below-the-ball swings, and then lose in the tenth on an infield hit-stolen base-sac bunt-sac fly Anaheim special.

I was wrong:

(Photo: Reuters / Boston.com)

If you want to know what being a sports fan means, that picture says it all: nine innings of frayed nerves and frustration released in the time in took for the ball to clear the Green Monster.

If there’s something you need
That you just don’t have
Well just don’t sit there
Feeling bad
Come on now get up
Try and understand
Just raise your hand
(Bruce Springsteen)

The game itself has been commented on and written about all over the Nation, so I'd like to focus in on one thing: that photograph. I love how, although Manny is in the foreground, the photographer has focused on the crowd and on the Sox players leaving the dugout. Manny has set things in motion, but the ball (nowhere to be seen) and the bat (already falling to the ground) are almost irrelevant at that point in time. Manny's moment has become his teammates' moment, his manager's moment, the crowd's moment. The picture captures only a small part of Fenway, but almost every single fan in the shot has their hands in the air in an unconscious imitation of Manny. Or, possibly, Manny has his hands in the air in an unconscious - and un-self-conscious - imitation of the 37,000 people in the ballpark.

After being a staunch Manny defender for a good while, I've started giving him a hard time this season for all those things people always bring up - his lack of hustle, his average defense, his 'no worries' attitude - but last night went a long way to getting me back on the Manny supporters' bus. Seeing him stand there with his hands in the air reminded me that this is a guy who loves to play the game of baseball and plays it with a childlike enthusiasm that is rare at that level. There are those who will see that picture and say he's grandstanding, but they'd be wrong. He's like the little kid playing baseball in the back yard with his dad, swinging and missing dozens of times until he suddenly connects with the ball and sends it over his dad's head. The hands raised are not "Look how good I am", but "Holy shit! Did I just do that?", a reminder that, whatever else baseball may be, when it comes down to the crunch, it's still just a simple bat-and-ball game.

------------

Since I'm feeling magnanimous (or maybe that's magMannnymous...) and focusing on the little things, I'd also like to give a tip of the Baseball Desert cap to K-Rod. Not for serving up the game-winning hit to Manny, but for that split-second pause he had as he left the field to allow Manny to finish his home run trot. It's not like he was going to run into him or anything, and he didn't exactly stop to shake Manny's hand, but to me that pause in his step said "I gave it my best shot and you beat me." Warm fuzzies all round...

------------

Hmmmm, feeling good about Manny and K-Rod, both of whom have the ability to annoy the everlasting crap out of me without even really trying? I think fatigue has finally caught up with me...

Language lesson

2007-09-19T12:17:00.000+02:00

In light of last night's game - and in the interests of linguistic accuracy - I suggest that the Red Sox change the name on Huit-Trois' jersey from Gagné to Perdu.

I didn't see the game, so I can't comment on what went wrong and how, but I can ask one very simple question:

"What the fuck is going on?"

Answers on a postcard, please, to the usual address...

Liar, Liar

2007-09-16T10:59:00.000+02:00

Or: Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.

Well, that whole 'take a couple of days off' thing lasted about about 12 hours. In my defence, it was only 10pm and the game was on TV - what else could I do? Deciding not to get up at 2am to watch is one thing, but not watching a game that is on during normal waking hours just struck me as silly. The Sox made the whole process easier for me by sending Commander Kick Ass of the F@#k Yeah Brigade to the mound and scoring 10 runs in reply to the Yankees' 1 (thank you Mr Ellsbury).

I said yesterday that I hate the stress of Yankee games, but I'd like to amend my statement: I hate the stress of Yankee games when I'm watching in the middle of the night. If you've ever had to get up at 1am/2am/4am to do anything, you'll know that it's not a time of day when you're at your best. Obviously your body is tired, but more importantly your mind is tired, so every little irritation (a 6-run Yankee rally, for example) is magnified a hundred times. Even if you're doing this because you love it, there's a limit to how much you can take, and I think I'm reaching my limit right about now. I've watched more games this season than ever before, at all times of the night, weekdays and weekends, but with hindsight, it might have been good to establish some Joba Rules to avoid burnout:

No consecutive weekday night games
No West Coast games, unless they're day games
No 3- or 4- consecutive game streaks
No Sunday night games if I'm working on Monday

In application of Rule 4, I'll leave Schilling vs. Clemens in the capable hands of the rest of Red Sox Nation and I'll see you tomorrow, hopefully 6 1/2 games up and with a magic number of 7.

Grumpy Old Man

2007-09-15T15:46:00.000+02:00

In the movie Keeping The Faith, there's a scene where Ben Stiller's Rabbi Jake Schram is quizzed about a date the previous night, and his reply is: "Well, it was mostly horrible, but with a few, brief moments of excruciating agony. But at least it was long..."

Well, that pretty much sums up last night's game.

Let it be stated for the record: I hate Yankee games. They make me nervous, even when the Sox are ahead. And if things should start to go pear-shaped - as they did last night - depresson sets in quicker than you can say "Okajima gives up four earned runs."

Though I will always qualify myself as a Red Sox fan, I watch baseball as a leisure activity. And even if the majority of games I watch are at unsociable hours, it's still what I do to relax after, say, a crappy week at work. When I sit down to watch, I know that the Sox aren't going to win every game, and that's OK - I'm watching because I'm interested in those famous 60 games that make or break a season (the theory being that every team will win 60 games a season and lose 60 games a season, and that what happens in the 60 others is what decides a team's fate). Losing isn't enjoyable, but it is part of the whole fan package, so I can deal with it.

However, for some reason, I can't deal with Yankee games - I derive no enjoyment from them whatsoever, even the ones that the Red Sox win. Last night I felt more like someone waiting for root canal work at the dentist's than a guy enjoying a game of baseball. When the Sox went ahead 4-1, I found myself grimacing at the TV like some escapee from a lunatic asylum, yelling "C'mon - let's get some more runs and bury these motherfuckers!" Niiiice...

Even with the Sox ahead by 5 runs I felt nervous, aware that the Yankees are aways only a couple of hits away from a big rally. When things went spectaclarly bad, it felt like getting punched in the face by that smug little bastard at school that you'd always hated. And suddenly, at about 5:45am, as the Sox were failing to rally at the end of the second-longest nine-inning game in the history of baseball, a simple question occurred to me: "Why? Why the fuck am I sat here trading a much-needed good night's sleep for five hours of anxiety and stress?" Life can be crappy enough as it is wthout voluntarily adding to mess.

So further to that dawn revelation, here's the deal: I'm still Red Sox through and through, but I'm not watching any more games this weekend. If Beckett throws a perfect game today and the Sox score 27 runs off Clemens tomorrow, then so be it. I need a couple of days to put baseball on the back-burner and spend my time and energy worrying about more important things.

All thing consdered, this is probably not a bad thing, since real life - specifically, work life - is going to change radically in a couple of weeks. In my present job, I can afford to have days where I drift along on cruise control after a 4am game aganst Oakland. However, on October 1st I'm starting a new job, which is going to require 110% of my attention and effort, so it's unlikely that I'll be as free to watch as many games or write as many blog posts as I do right now. In that sense, this Yankee series will have served as a useful wake-up call and reminder that, as much as I love the game of baseball and the Boston Red Sox, they are an accompaniment to life in the real world, not a substitute for it.

Rule check

2007-09-09T16:18:00.000+02:00

Just wanted to be sure this is how it works:

If I didn't see the game, it didn't happen. Right?

The Million-Dollar Arm / Ten-Cent-Head Club

2007-09-08T09:38:00.000+02:00

Members: Calvin 'Nook' LaLoosh and Daniel Cabrera.

There are certain things that you just can't do on a baseball field, and Cabrera stepped way over that line last night. Not even the Orioles broadcasters* were prepared to defend Cabrera after he threw behind Pedroia. The whole thing looked like it was going to get ugly, but in the end it didn't, thanks in part to...Julian Tavarez?? (Was that really him I saw out there talking to Cabrera and calming him down? It was 2.30am and I'm not sure my mind wasn't playing tricks on me...)

The Sox eventually took the high road, led by Pedroia himself:

"It just made him look even more stupid doing that. I was hoping he stayed in the game. I was just concentrating on hitting another line drive off him."

In the end, it didn't really matter, because by the time Cabrera was ejected, the game was all but over and the magic number down to 15, thanks to some good pitching from Jon Lester and some timely Sox hitting.

Speaking of timely hitting, I'd like to point out that MLB.com has this graphic up on the game recap page:
I've been giving J.D. Drew a hard time lately - I think at some point in an IM conversation with Beth this week I suggested trading him for a new lawn-mower - so it is only fair that I do point out when he makes a valuable contribution. I just hope it's more than just a statistical anomaly.

*Given that I have to watch the non-NESN TV feed around half of the time, I have to say that the Orioles team (Gary Thorne and Jim Palmer) come top of the list of broadcast teams I like to listen to. They're not too intrusive, are knowledgeable about the game (outside of the occasional 'Manny being Manny' generalisation, and there isn't a broadcast team in the country not guilty of that) and although they root for the Orioles, they don't do it in a Hawk 'You can put it on the board.....YES!' Harrelson manner.

As an ex-player, Palmer is insightful without drifting off into nostalgia for the good ol' days or pointless musings on nothing at all. I love me some NESN, but - and forgive the heresy here - Don and Jerry can be a little too, erm, 'distracted' from time to time. Not so with the Orioles team (at least from my limited experience). Watching the Orioles has not always been a lot of fun recently, but their broadcast team makes the experience as enjoyable as possible.

Thumbs-up to MASN from the Baseball Desert.

Crisp performance

2007-09-07T19:00:00.000+02:00

I know that it's all Buchholz around Red Sox Nation today - three innings of one-hit relief; bases loaded, nobody out, nobody scores! - and rightly so, but as the President of the Society of Under-Appreciated Center Fielders, I'd like to point out that without Coco's contribution, Buchholz is probably still sat on the bench at that point, watching Kyle Snyder eat up some innings.

Not content with a three-run contribution in the fourth, Coco then got on in the ninth with an infield hit. I don't know what the NESN team said about it, but the Orioles broadcasters were convinced it was a drag bunt à la Ichiro, and it sure looked like it from the highlights. So Coco got on, stole second by a mile and scored the winning run on Varitek's single.

Game, set and match: Covelli Crisp.

Edit: A swinging bunt, not a drag bunt, obviously.

Lost in translation

2007-09-04T10:53:00.000+02:00

Well, the Sox won last night, but I'm damn pleased I wasn't there to see it. Daisuke and Lopez giving up 9 earned runs in 5 1/3 innings would not have been good for my health.

I have to admit that, as much as I like watching him pitch, Daisuke drives me crazy. After 15 years of life in a foreign country, I know that cultural differences can play a major role in any professional context. But in Daisuke's case, I have trouble dealing with those differences.

It's somewhat ironic, because the trait that I have the most trouble with is one which people - especially here in France, where everybody wears their emotions on their sleeve - readily associate with me. The comments are always along the same lines: "We're never know what you're thinking", "You never get worked up", "You always seem so calm." For the most part, I like that. I don't think it'd be enough to make me an overnight success on the World Poker Tour, but there are plenty of situations in which it's good not to show your cards all the time.

Daisuke's poker face, however, always seems to be taken to the extreme. My annoyance began in earnest last week, when he kicked off the Yankees series by giving up 5 runs (including 2 home runs) and taking the loss. It's bad enough getting kicked in the nuts by the Yankees, but seeing your starting pitcher watch the ball fly out of the ballpark without showing a hint of anything is too much.
Boston Red Sox pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka, of Japan, adjusts his cap after giving up a three-run home run to Toronto Blue Jays' Troy Glaus during the sixth inning at Fenway Park in Boston, Monday, Sept. 3, 2007. (Photo: AP; Caption: Yahoo Sports )

I don't necessarily want him throwing at guys, destroying water coolers or punching dugout phones, but I need something to work with. I want to sense he's taking this beating as badly as I am.

Of course, this is not going to happen, just as I'm not going to start leaping around the office as soon as anything starts to go wrong. Daisuke is a package. The culture and history that mean he remains stone-faced on the mound are the same culture and history which mean he can, say, throw 130 pitches on 3 days' rest, so I'll just have to take the rough with the smooth and deal with it. And if the smooth means 18 wins by the end of the season, I think I'll probably be able to handle it pretty well.

Texas Hold 'Em

2007-09-02T20:23:00.000+02:00

This was an historic game that almost got away, in more ways than one.

It almost got away from Buchholz, but Pedroia - and Coco - came to the rescue. It also almost got away from me, but this was a night on which the baseball gods were looking down on me.

The superstitious romantic in me would like to think that the gods were evening things up a little, since 4,000 miles away there were Sox fans who'd decided not to watch the game. After three straight lossses to the Yankees and Friday night's close-but-no-cigar game, I have to admit I was feeling much the same way as Beth, so much so that I didn't go to bed at 9pm as I usually do in preparation for a 7pm ET start.

So I'd made up my mind - an old Alfred Hitchcock movie on cable, and then off to bed for a good night's sleep. The movie finished around 1.15am, and I should have been heading for the bedroom, but something - those baseball gods? - made me switch on the PC to see how the Sox were doing. Of course, once you switched the game on, it's pretty damn hard to switch it off, so 2.30am rolled around and I was still sat there watching, fighting tiredness almost on every pitch. I decided that if the Sox were still up 4-0 after 4 1/2, I'd call it a night, but as I went to click off the MLB.TV window, it suddenly hit me that Buchholz had put up a bunch of zeroes. Now there was no way I could go anywhere.

Through innings 6 and 7 I kept getting up out of my chair to pace around, because 1) I was starting to get nervous, and 2) I was desperately trying to stay awake. Superstition finally kicked in in the 8th, when I sat back down again clutching my favourite old baseball, and did not move until Buchholz retired Markakais to end the game. By the time he did that, I was wide awake, despite the late hour, willing every pitch to be a strike, and every batted ball to be caught.

In the end, I didn't get to sleep until about 5am, but it was worth it. The gods don't often give you games like that. When they do, you have to grab them and store them away in the memory bank, so as to be able to bring them out whenever you want and savour them over and over again.

Numbers

2007-08-28T13:13:00.000+02:00

3: The number of outs recorded on Mike Redmond's ground ball to third base in the seventh inning at Jacobs Field last night.

2: The number of times the Yankees have given up 16 runs or more in the past week. Ouch.

2: The number of games Mike Timlin needs to play in to reach 1,000 career appearances. The career stats are fun to look at:

He has had 497 teammates in all, according to baseball-reference.com, from Dave Parker, who was 40 when Timlin was a rookie, to Clay Buchholz, the 23-year-old Sox prospect who was 2 1/2 years old in 1987, when Timlin made his professional debut in Medicine Hat, Alberta,

but more interesting are his current stats, which have got lost in the Sox' recent surge:

He's no longer the team's primary setup man, a role passed to Okajima and now Eric Gagné, but no one can accuse him of just hanging on, either. In his last 21 appearances, spanning 27 1/3 innings, he has been scored upon just once, allowing two earned runs, for an ERA of 0.66 in that span.

If the Sox have a successful end to the season, then you can add Timlin to the growing list of unsung MVPs.

Stingy

2007-08-27T12:56:00.000+02:00

After a 46-run weekend, I was going to step back and take a look at the pitching performances against the White Sox, which, in case you hadn't noticed, were most excellent, but papel-blog beat me to it.

I'd just like to reiterate that the Red Sox staff (bullpen included) gave up just 7 runs in four games. Seven. The offense could have scored 35 runs less than it did and they'd still have won the series. Admittedly, they weren't facing the '27 Yankees out there, but the White Sox are hardly a Little League team either, so the performances are worth noting.

My own personal favourite was Tavarez, who pitched a peach of a game on 6 days' rest, keeping the White Sox in check long enough for the bats to get warm and chase Vazquez from the game. He's still one of my heroes of this season - a guy from whom little was expected but who has delivered big-time.

-------
Before leaving the weekend sweep behind, I just wanted to point out a couple of gems from around Red Sox Nation:

After seeing the "Why me?" look on Ozzie Guillen's face all weekend, I can but agree with papel-blog:
I seriously thought he was going to rush the mound while his own team was pitching during the eighth inning on Saturday. If Ozzie becomes the first manager to start an on-the-field brawl with his own team before the season is over, I will not be least bit surprised.
Meanwhile, over at Basegirl, Kristen and Annette have delved deep into that scary place they call their imaginations and have scripted the future. Miss it at your peril.

This post is brought to you by:

2007-08-26T18:00:00.000+02:00

Mike Lowell, King of the Land of Awesome.

In his last ten games, Lowell is 16-for-35, which works out at a tidy .457 batting average. He's also had 6 walks, scored 9 runs, driven in 13 and only struck out 3 times.

In addition to going 4-for-6 yesterday, Lowell was also involved in what, for me, was the play of the game in the sixth inning. You could sense momentum start to shift as the Sox started putting some hits together, but Lowell's heads-up play - where he basically snuck home from third base whilst the White Sox were lollygagging the ball into the infield - was the kind of play that takes any remaining wind out of the opposing team's sails. Which it promptly did, to the tune of 11 more runs and a league-leading 16th win for Wake.

A sweep would be a nice way to go into New York on Tuesday. You hear me, Julian?

Double the fun

2007-08-25T15:30:00.000+02:00

The Sox won, twice. And better than that, they won whilst hitting the crap out of the ball.

I watched the first game in its entirety (alongside my Dad, who lept me busy for nine nnings with questions like "Why is that a strike? Why is he not running? Why so many commercial breaks?") His questions meant I wasn't paying as much attenton to the finer points of the game as I should have been, but I vaguely remember a couple of key hits that weren't quite off the meat of the bat.

I had hoped to watch Game 2 live, but the first game went on for so damn long that I just couldn't physically do it, so all I saw of it was the MLB.TV condensed game first thing this morning. I usually avoid the condensed game format, because it gives you no real idea of how the game was actually played out - it's just a loosely-connected series of hits, outs and runs. But watching hit after hit after hit this morning allowed me to realise that almost every single hit in Game 2 was a rocket. You could see - and hear - the ball being belted all over the field, and it was a fine. I'll take a win any day of the week, but a win built on solid pitching and solid hitting is soothing for the Red Sox soul.

---------

Also soothing for the Red Sox soul: a Yankee loss in Detroit. On a walk-off home run. In the 11th inning. At 3:30am. Our hats should be tipped in the direction of Carlos Guillen, who is, to quote Sam,

a unicorn being ridden by an entire litter of small kittens down a road made of cupcakes.

It's almost enough to make you feel a little sympathy for the Yankees.

Almost.

Bad day

2007-08-23T14:39:00.000+02:00

You know you're in trouble when this:

5IP, 9H, 6R, 6ER

is your best pitching line from the box score.

The only positive thing the O's can take from this game is that it only counts for one in the 'L' column.

Special mention should go to the unfortunate Brian Burres, who managed to give up 8 earned runs in 2/3 of an inning, and to Wes Littleton, who was the recipient of the game's most bizarre stat: a save, with a 27-run lead. (For the explanation, see point 3 of rule 10.19 here).

Strange days, indeed...

My kinda headline

2007-08-21T10:22:00.000+02:00

I wish I could claim that my secret has finally been revealed:

but unfortunately any hope of keeping up the pretense is dashed in the first sentence of the article - it's Kevin Cash, not Iain Cash.

However, if anyone from the front office is reading this, I'd like to state for the record that, should they be in the market for a no-hit, good-glove center fielder with limited speed on the basepaths, I am ready...

Erm...

2007-08-19T10:53:00.000+02:00

Dear Jered,

If you don't like to see David Ortiz showboating after a grand slam, then may I suggest you don't throw him fastballs down the middle of the plate?

All the best,
Iain

Phenom Phriday

2007-08-17T12:06:00.000+02:00

"And what will it be today, sir? A tall, cocky Texan, maybe, to start today against the Angels?

"Oh, you have two games today, do you? Well, it just so happens we have another one, tucked away in the back room for special occasions. He comes highly recommended:"

In the plan drawn up for Buchholz before this season, the idea was to improve his command of the [changeup] and increase its use in games. Check.

"I can throw it any time I want to throw it," Buchholz said. Or, as Cather said, "Now that pitch, he's throwing it 2-1, he's throwing it 2-0. He's throwing it 3-1. He'll throw it 3-2. He loves the pitch. The thing about it is, he's looking at probably 14- to 15-miles-an-hour separation off his fastball with the same arm speed and intensity."

"Enjoy the game, sir."

I feel good, na-na-na-na-na-na-na...

2007-08-10T11:29:00.000+02:00

The St. Louis Cardinals usually find a multitude of ways to annoy the crap out of me, but even I couldn't fail to smile at this story.

Ankiel may not be the Second Coming of Babe Ruth, but to come back in any way, shape or form after a public meltdown of epic proportions deserves a respectful tip of the cap.

Batteries fully charged

2007-08-08T19:36:00.000+02:00

If you want to truly gauge the level of any addiction, then going cold turkey is a good way to do so. Nineteen days without any Red Sox baseball (not even a day-old USA Today boxscore) was more than enough to remind me that, despite feeling burned out only a few weeks ago, summer without the Sox is just not summer.

I have to admit that total isolation was probably a good thing. If you do get the odd box score, all that does is make you want to know more, which in turn means you spend your days trying to find elaborate ways to get detailed game reports, and then suddenly you realise that your two weeks of vacation have gone and all you've done is worry about the lead the Sox have over the Yankees, and you've failed to look around and enjoy the view:

Unfortnately the view has - in the best Cinderella tradition - reverted back to something far more prosaic, but the silver lining is that I can once more sit out on the balcony with the laptop and watch the Sox:

(Well, I could if it weren't pouring with rain and if the Sox weren't playing the Angels in the middle of the bloody night, but you know what I mean).

Rumour has it that I missed a lot during my vacation (Eric Gagne in a Sox uniform! A Jon Lester win!! A Julio Lugo grand-slam!!! A David Ortiz stolen base!!!!), but there's still a helluva lot of ball to played this season, and this is when the fun really starts.

Bring it on...

Burnout

2007-07-18T15:02:00.000+02:00

You don't need to be an eagle-eyed observer to notice that there's been more desert than baseball around here recently. My actual, real life seems to have done a good job of shoving my online life out of the way for a while.

Not so very long ago, all these missed Sox games - and the numerous blog posts which only ever get written in my head - would have been cause for concern, but I'm at a point in time right now where I don't really care.

I think much of this is due to the fact that I'm stood at a career crossroads right now, looking down a new, scary, fascinating path, and baseball games - as much as I love them - have taken a back seat. Case in point: last night. I dozed off whilst reading, but my in-built baseball clock woke me up at around 1am (just in time for the first pitch of the game). However, instead of leaping out of bed to fire up the PC, I weighed up the pros and cons of getting up to watch Wake do his thing, and the cons - a need to be on-the-ball in an early-morning meeting with my future boss and some of his team - beat out the Red Sox quite easily (just like the Kansas City Royals).

Saturday marks the start of 2 1/2 weeks' vacation for me, and usually this signals the beginning of mild panic attacks at the thought of 18 days without any access to Sox baseball. But this year, I'm off, outta here, hitting the road with barely a glance in the rear-view mirror. I'll try to keep up with at least the scores of the games, but I won't be searching out the nearest Internet café to look for any more details. The Sox will do their thing and I'll do mine, and when I get back, we'll see how this new, slightly platonic relationship is working out.

I know that others have had this feeling of burnout recently, so it's comforting to know that I'm not quite in a minority of one. I like what one of the comments to that post said:

I hear you: I also get a bit discouraged from time to time; my interest in blogging waxes and wanes depending on a lot of things. It's nice to see your hits increase and stuff, but at the end of the day I know that there are a few dedicated people - mainly friends - who read what I have to say and I'm mainly blogging for myself anyway. Some kind of expression, typing out my thoughts, keeping book reviews archived; whatever it might be.

That's me - writing not for world domination, but mainly for myself (to avoid getting locked up in a padded call, as I wrote way back when) and a few dedicated readers. So, dedicated reader, please allow me to echo Ernie's thoughts in his original post:

Anyway [the site]'s not going away, but don't be surprised if the updates are sporadic over the summer. If something exciting or noteworthy happens I may become inspired to write about it.

So keep an eye on your RSS feed - I'll be back when 1) my vacation's over, and 2) I feel inspired to add my two penn'th to the collective wisdom of Red Sox Nation*.

*If you want my honest opinion, that'll probably be about twenty minutes after I set foot back in our apartment. Red Sox - quand tu me tiens...

Mind games

2007-07-13T16:00:00.000+02:00

Totally unrelated to baseball, but via Joy of Sox comes this:

Sometimes I think the human mind is the greatest mystery of the universe.

Key to the game

2007-07-13T14:41:00.000+02:00

Lots of good stuff in last night's win, but none better than the Sox' 2nd at-bat of the game:

Pedroia was 0-2 after two pitches, but four foul balls and four balls later, he was stood on first base - two on, and nobody out. The AB was key not only because it immediately bumped up Halladay's pitch-count, but also because it signalled the Sox' continued intention to take pitches until they get the ones they want.

At-bats like that are one of the reasons I love this game. Baseball is easy to love when you're watching towering home-runs and dramatic catches in the outfield, but its real essence is to be found in this one-on-one confrontation that happens 60 or 70 times a game. Those who are not fans of the game (*cough* Mrs Iain *cough*) will always ask why nothing is happening during these long at-bats. When that happens, I try to to explain that it's like some elaborate chess match, where all the previous configurations of the matchup are figured into this battle of wits where both pitcher and hitter are trying to get the upper hand for a fraction of a second, but it's hard to convince someone who isn't ready to be convinced.

Hmmm...it would appear I'm waxing lyrical about one at-bat in one game in the middle of July. Methinks I've missed baseball more than I originally thought these past couple of weeks...

Tempting fate

2007-07-12T16:45:00.000+02:00

You would find it hard to accuse me of being an especially superstitious baseball fan, but I do have to admit to cringing whenever I read an article with the sub-heading "club is cruising along in '07".

I agree with the idea that the glass is still half-full in Red Sox Nation, but the notion of 'cruising' just seems to push all the wrong buttons in my brain. Given the choice, I'd rather be cruising than speeding foot-to-the-floor towards a breakdown of epic proportions, but I just do not feel comfortable with articles that state, on July 12, "the Red Sox are in the playoffs." [Warning: it's a CHB piece - if you're allergic, please don't click on the link].

Still, the MLB.com article does give us a chance to look back over five classic highlights from the first half of the season which remind us that this club is capable of playing some serious kick-ass baseball. It would be very nice indeed if we could see some more of that tonight against the Blue Jays and get the second half off on the right foot.

A kid's game

2007-07-11T15:30:00.000+02:00

I'm not a big fan of the All-Star Game (regardless of whether it 'counts' or not) but I have to say that any occasion on which Jose Reyes - currently making $2.8m as the shortstop of the New York Mets and one of the game's future megastars - catches Willie Mays' ceremonial pitch and then, like a little kid watching BP, whips out a pen to get Mays to sign the ball, can't be all bad.

On a related note: Willie Mays is 76 years old, hasn't played a professional baseball game since 1973, and he still has a better throwing arm than Johnny Damon...

All-round good guys

2007-07-10T16:47:00.000+02:00

If watching David Ortiz present Vladimir Guerrero with a 'magic bat' during the Home Run Derby is not enough to convince you that ballplayers are not all major-league assholes, then a look at the Phillies' performance in rescuing the Coors Field grounds crew on Sunday should do the trick.

(Hat tip: Baseball Musings and Balls, Sticks & Stuff).

Bad timing

2007-07-10T10:10:00.000+02:00

For the past ten days or so life has been a little crazy - I've had business meetings in both London and Frankfurt, flown with my daughters to drop them off for a week's vacation at my parents' house in Manchester, been offered a new job and handed in my notice at the old one (transforming myself overnight from just another employee into "the guy we'll never be able to replace in such a short period of time..."). Basically, I've done everything but watch baseball regularly.

Of course, Murphy's Law clearly states that when life eases up and you have some time to chill out at home and enjoy some Sox games, there are no Sox games to watch, because it's the All Star Game. Given the Tigers' sweep of the Sox over the weekend, this is probably no bad thing. The three days off will give the Sox - and me - an opportunity to recharge the batteries and be ready to go against the Blue Jays on Thursday. In the meantime, I'm sure Mrs. Iain is delighted to have Winter Guy around for a few evenings, even if that means having to put up a fight for control of the TV remote!

Wednesday Morning, 3AM

2007-06-27T13:53:00.000+02:00

Well, 4am, actually, but you get the picture. This is how it went:

4:00am Get up to watch the Sox-Mariners game.

4:10am Watch the Sox transform a bases-loaded, no-out situation into a single run.

4:30am Watch Kason Gabbard give up four bases on balls, hit a batter and walk in three runs.

4:35am Go back to bed.

Had it been 10pm, I might have stuck with the game, but I had a sneaking feeling that these would be three hours of my life that I wouldn't get back. And it turns out I was right.

The Mariners haven't been the best of teams in recent times, but they seem to have got the Sox' number right now - it's a good thing the series ends today. Still, despite everything, the Sox have a very respectable 25-16 road record - and remain ten games up in the division - but it'll be nice to head back to Boston for a little home cooking leading up to the All Star Break.

Brief Encounter

2007-06-23T15:42:00.000+02:00

It's not often that it happens to me, but this morning I had a close encounter of the baseball fan kind here in Paris.

As I was sat in Starbucks waiting for my wife and daughters to come out of the cinema next door, I noticed a young kid and his dad walking towards me. From a distance I thought I recognised the logo on the kid's t-shirt, but I wasn't quite sure. As he got closer, I was pleased to note that my eyesight isn't yet completely shot to hell: I had indeed spotted a red 'C' with a bearcub inside.

As the two of them went by, I was able to see that this was definitely a genuine fan, as only a genuine fan would be sporting a #9 Juan Pierre jersey. He and his dad had almost gone by when the kid looked up and noticed my Red Sox t-shirt (Red Sox on the front, 20 / Youkilis on the back). He tugged at his dad's sleeve and pointed in my direction. They were clearly in a rush to get somewhere, so there was no long baseball conversation - just a nod and a knowing smile - but it was nice to feel for a couple of seconds that I wasn't completely alone in the baseball desert.

The high-fidelity first class travelling set

2007-06-22T14:42:00.000+02:00

Money, get away.
Get a good job with good pay and youre okay.
Money, its a gas.
Grab that cash with both hands and make a stash.
New car, caviar, four star daydream,
Think Ill buy me a football team.

Pink Floyd

Roger Clemens has so far pitched three games for the Yankees, all against National League teams, and what does he have to show for it? About $2.7m and a 1-2 record. Ouch.

OK, so W-L is not a fair stat by which to judge poor Rog. Still, the Yankees have at least gotten themselves a bona-fide horse, an innings-eater who will pitch deep into the game and save those precious bullpen arms, right? Erm, wrong

No-one expected Clemens to pitch a complete game every time out, but at almost $1m for 4 1/3 innings, Steinbrenner would have been better off just piling his money up in the middle of Yankee Stadium and setting fire to it. At least it would have been entertaining to watch.

The inside story

2007-06-21T12:58:00.000+02:00

The scene: Wednesday June 20th, Red Sox locker room, Turner Field.

David Ortiz: Hey bro', I been reading on the Internet that that Baseball Desert dude ain't watching all our games anymore.

Coco Crisp: You serious? You mean he's been missing the return of Coco's pop?

David Ortiz: S'what he said. He's just watching the highlights 'n' shit...

Coco Crisp: Man, he's been waiting a year to see me hit the crap outta the ball, and now he's taking time off? The hell is up with that?

David Ortiz: You need to teach him a lesson, bro'. You know, hit another one out tonight. Three homers in three days - he ain't ever gonna believe that shit!

Coco Crisp: Dude - I might just do that...

-----------

For Coco's information, I was watching, and it was a good night of baseball. When the Braves walked Varitek to get to Coco, I was already smiling - they played the season percentages, but ignored the fact that Coco is red-hot right now. Cue three-run homer, a silenced home crowd and a 5-0 first-inning lead.

My man JT took that as his cue to throw another great game. The Sox gave him 8 runs to play with, but one would have been enough. It's going to take more than blisters and the blues to stop the Tavarez juggernaut from rolling on...

QED

2007-06-20T08:36:00.000+02:00

See - they did just fine without me.

I haven't watched the full highlights yet, but the defensive play of the game seems to be Coco's spectacular catch in the fifth (and Josh agrees). I know it's what these guys are paid to do, but it's always enjoyable to see something like that, especially when the player in question just dusts himself off afterwards and wanders coolly back to his position.

One interesting footnote to the catch: if you watch the clip on MLB.com, you'll see that it took both the Atlanta announcers and the cameraman by surprise. Not so Alex Cora. You'll see that Cora raises a celebratory fist about a second before the ball lands in Coco's glove, almost as if it were a routine pop-fly on the infield. That, ladies and gentlemen, is confidence in your teammates.

For love of the game

2007-06-19T11:40:00.000+02:00

Last night we finished dinner at around 8:30pm, and I was all set to get into my gameday routine: off to bed at 9pm and then up at 1am for the 7:05 ET start. Then it occurred to me - I really didn't feel like getting up to watch the game. There wasn't any particular reason - I wasn't especially tired, I didn't have a tough day at work ahead and there was no reason to believe that Schilling would get shelled again - it's just that I didn't feel like it.

Despite my passion for the Red Sox, this is not a cause for concern. It happens occasionally, and when it does, I usually just take the night off and come back refreshed for the next game. What I noticed last night, however, was something that's been creeping in this season. Having decided that I'd spend the evening doing something other than watching baseball, I suddenly started thinking about the running tally of the number of games I've seen: "If I push myself to watch this one, I can add another game to the total."

I'm slightly ashamed to admit that it actually took me a couple of seconds to step back from that statement and think: "WTF?!" Keeping a running total of the number of games was supposed to be just an interesting comment on my crazy baseball-watching habits, but now it seems to have become an end in itself. Even if my life sometimes seems to revolve around the Red Sox, this is not how things are supposed to be. I enjoy getting the looks and comments from people when I tell them how I spend my evenings from April through October, but I don't want to get to the point where that's all I'm concerned about.

There are a couple of steps needed to remedy this. Step 1 is to stop the running total. I think it's clear to anyone who reads this blog - including myself - that I'm a bona fide Red Sox fan. I don't need to back that up with numbers. And it's fairly obvious that, like most passionate Sox fans, I spend more time than I should worrying about a bunch of millionaires playing a game, but I'm not going to try to change that, any more than I'm going to try to stop liking sushi. It is what it is: part of my makeup, and if Roger Angell says it's OK to care, then who am I to argue?

Step 2 is to not worry about not seeing the games or taking a couple of nights off. The world will not come to an end because I miss a game or two, nor will my membership of Red Sox Nation (European Chapter) be revoked. The Sox'll do their thing whether I'm there or not, but when I am there, it should be because I want to see the game, and not because I feel I need to make some kind of statement.

So tonight I may watch the game, or I may go and do something completely crazy like spend a little time with the family. I'm sure that, in my absence, the Sox and Red Sox Nation will keep thing ticking over.

Sighs of relief

2007-06-18T11:22:00.000+02:00

A lot of good things happened in the series against the Giants, but if you're looking for key moments, they once again came from the Sox relievers:

In Saturday's tight 1-0 game, Okajima came in in the eighth, gave up a walk and a hit, and then proceeded to get Bonds (strikeout, looking - read what Giants GM Brian Sabean had to say about that here), Molina (flyout) and Frandsen (ground out) to extinguish the fire.

Yesterday, Giants trailing by three, bases loaded, one out - Joel Pineiro comes in and gets an inning-ending DP with his very first pitch.

Daisuke and Wake got the respective wins, but those two games were won in those two spots. In both cases I was already composing the "They're only human" post, only to be proved completely wrong. If being proved wrong on a daily basis means that we're going to win more games in this fashion, then I'm happy to take one for the team as long as it's needed.

The good news this Monday morning - above and beyond the sweep - is that after the shaky period the Sox went through earlier this month the standings still look like this:

The Sox lead the division by 8 1/2 games, their W-L over the last ten games now stands at a very respectable 7-3 and they still have the best record in baseball. Which mean that this:

is most definitely a glass half-full.

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Obsessive Anal-Retentive Game Counter: 55

Old friends

2007-06-16T12:06:00.000+02:00

I would have settled for this:

(photo: MLB.com)

but the Dustin and J.D Show was an added bonus.

Despite Perdoia's home run in the 1st, I thought we were screwed when Papi got thrown out of the game, which just shows you how much I - or indeed any of us - know about baseball. The ejection was bullshit on two counts: 1) it didn't look like a third strike and 2) it was clear that the umpire had his finger on the trigger as Papi walked back to the dugout and was just waiting to pull it. As Jerry Remy said: "C'mon on...." Having said that, Papi is always bitching about calls, and I'm surprised he doesn't get thrown out more often, so I guess we can chalk this one up as a balancing of the karmic scales.

What kept the Sox in the game and allowed our #1 and #2 hitters to basically run the show, was yet another great performance by Julian Tavarez (complete with fielding signs and a bowling-ball out at first). I've said I before, but it bears repeating: this guy has kept us in more games than we had a right to expect. Despite going up against opponents' aces left, right and centre, he has done a great job. There are a lot of star players on the Sox roster, many of whom have performed well so far, but if there's a ballot for Red Sox MVP for the first half of the season, my vote goes to Jools, if only for the complete turnaround from last season.

Viva El Yo-Yo!

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Obsessive Anal-Retentive Game Counter: 53

Philosophical question

2007-06-15T08:21:00.000+02:00

It's Friday (yes!!), and my head is filled with some of life's great philosophical questions, not least of which is:

Are the Sox losing because I'm not watching them, or am I not watching them because they're losing?

Whichever way you look at it, part of me is glad not to be getting up in the wee small hours of the morning to watch them them score a grand total of 6 runs in the last four games, good for one win and three losses.

The weekend is about to roll around, so I'll be in front of my TV/PC for the three games against the Giants. This'll mean having to watch Barry Bonds, but I look at it as taking one for the team, the sacrifice needed in order to be able to say thanks - from a distance - to an all-time Red Sox hero:

(photo: Getty images)

What was he thinking?

2007-06-09T14:37:00.000+02:00

If you've ever wondered what goes through a pitcher's mind when he's in the middle of a potentially historic game, you now have the answer.

This is exactly the kind of post that I'm interested in as a fan. Not just the details of pitch selection and execution, but the thought processes behind them and, in this specific instance, how a player - and his teammates - deal with coming so close:

"As soon as the ball hit the outfield grass I thought 'Ok what do I want to do with Ellis?' I hadn’t even contemplated him hitting up to this point. Tek was starting to come to the mound, Mike did as well. I waved them both off as I was absolutely locked into getting this next out. This win was something we sorely needed but it was cool as hell to know the two veteran leaders on this team are that aware of how the game and the mind can work. Neither wanted me to let this slip by going to a bad place mentally."

Allez les Dodgers!

2007-06-09T12:41:00.000+02:00

An update on our man Joris Bert, who did make history yesterday as the first French player ever to be drafted. He was selected in the 19th round by the Dodgers.

(photo: FFBSC)

It's still a long, hard road to the majors, but Joris has at least got his foot in the door. The Baseball Desert wishes him bon vent...

J.D. and Julio down by the ballyard

2007-06-09T11:37:00.000+02:00

So, apparently, there's this J.D. Drew guy on the Red Sox team? I guess he must be a new acquisition, as I don't remember seeing him round before. But if he's going to have career-high seven-RBI nights, maybe we can persuade him to play more often.

I don't know - maybe he was due. Maybe the J.D. Drew we'd been seeing was some under-performing clone playing whilst the real J.D. Drew was on a long vacation in Aruba. Maybe he just didn't want to suck horribly in front his little brother. Whatever the reason, I'd like to say that we like this J.D. Drew and we'd be delighted to see him stick around for a while.

Note to Julio Lugo: We also like the whole 'leadoff home runs and heads-up rally-killing plays at second base' thing you had going last night. Keep it up.

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Obsessive Anal-Retentive Game Counter: 51

The blame game

2007-06-08T08:31:00.000+02:00

Wanna know who was responsible for Schilling not getting the no-hitter?

It was Red. No, wait, it was Ernie. Erm, no, it was Beth's fiancé, Steve.

Aaaah, Red Sox Nation, at its superstitious finest.

Actually, if we're looking for someone to blame, we need look no further than Schill:

"With two outs I was sure I had it," the 40-year-old Schilling said. "I shook off [Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek] and now I'll have to deal with a 'what-if' the rest of my life."
Varitek wanted a slider but Schilling wanted a fastball away. A's left fielder Shannon Stewart was looking for exactly the pitch Schilling threw.

Well, what's done is done. It was still a hell of a game and a great win for the Sox, who came off the field pumped and smiling, just one day after looking like they'd all been to somebody's funeral.

I'll leave the final word to The Man himself:

Tina Cervasio: "What were your emotions as that ball went through?"

Schilling: "It's a one-nothing game - let's get the out. We needed a win today more than anything, and I wanted to finish that game."

Mission accomplished. With bells on.

Two words

2007-06-08T00:05:00.000+02:00

Shannon Fuckin' Stewart.

My positive take on this - outside of it stopping the losing streak - is that the hit basically saved Lugo's ass. Had Schilling got the no-hitter, we'd all have been pointing at Lugo and saying: "Without that error, he'd have had a perfect game."

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Obsessive Anal-Retentive Game Counter: 50

Hell hath no fury...

2007-06-07T11:32:00.000+02:00

Man Stays With Friends In Pub; Fiancee Dumps Belongings In Harbour.

I'm not going to debate whether Ms Thompson's reaction may or may not have been a little over-the-top, but rather point out this phrase:

Mr Wilson only discovered what happened after his boss called to tell him the van had been spotted floating in the harbour.

Wow - I'd love to have been a fly on the wall of that particular conversation.

------------
If you came here looking for thoughts on the Red Sox and are now wondering why there have been three non-Sox posts in a row, it's because I've decided that these games - hidden out there on the West Coast - are not being played. Sox / A's? Dunno what you're talking about. I can see an interleague game against the Diamondbacks coming up on Friday, but that's about it.

In the meantime, my head is staying firmly buried in the sand.

French revolution?

2007-06-07T10:39:00.000+02:00

I don't usually follow the MLB draft, but today I'll be keeping an eye on the proceedings, as there is a possibility that Joris Bert could become the first-ever French player to be drafted.

Bert's stats this season at Frank Philips College - .395 BA, 28 RBI, 42 stolen bases in 49 games - have made some major league teams, including the Mariners, sit up and take notice. If he does get drafted, it may not quite signal the opening of the floodgates, but it's another small step towards the globalisation of the best game in the world.

Baseball à la française

2007-06-06T11:27:00.000+02:00

For those of you who are reading this in the Paris area and who might want to try your hand at a bit of baseball, you should check out the event being run by the FFBSC this coming weekend: Full details of the event can be found here.

It's an event aimed at promoting the three sports, particularly within the 6-18 year age range, so if you have kids who might be interested in playing baseball - or even just discovering what it's all about - then it could be a good way to while away a couple of hours this weekend.

In enemy territory

2007-06-06T10:05:00.000+02:00

In the comments to yesterday's post "Ben A" kindly pointed out this little gem: his buddy 'Matt D' on Letterman. It's doing the rounds of the Red Sox blogs, but I thought I'd post it anyway because 1) there are Baseball Desert readers who don't necessarily read the other Sox blogs out there, so I'm doing a public service, and 2) it'll take my mind off the Sox' ability to convert seven walks and two bases-loaded situations into absolutely fuck-all.

"Roger Clemens - what about that?"
"Yeah - that'll help..."
"But he used to pitch for the Red Sox?"
"He did - about forty years ago when he was twenty..."

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Obsessive Anal-Retentive Game Counter: 49