Empyreal Environs

He doesn’t have calm eyes or a signature throw, but he’s no Lugo, either. His name will infest your brain with the chorus “Sussudio,” but he has filled the role of leadoff hitter in Jacoby Ellsbury’s absence admirably.

Scu, scu, Scutaro! Whoa oh!

The Red Sox shortstop tied the game in the seventh with a two-run homer off Mark Hendrickson. For a relief pitcher, Hendrickson is a pretty good professional basketball player. The towering reliever sparked an inferno – after the home run he walked J.D. Drew. Buck Showalter pulled Hendrickson in favor of Alfredo Simon who gave up an RBI double to Victor Martinez.

Adrian Beltre didn’t cotton well to having David Ortiz intentionally walked ahead of him and lofted a shot that landed into the first row of the left field stands. The three-run shot padded the lead and Daniel Bard and Jonathan Papelbon paired to protect it.

Who can blame any Orioles pitcher for being terrible? They are shadowed by an odd female fan who mimics their every move as they warm up in their bullpen. One of Showalter’s first moves should have been filing a restraining order against her, but despite the oversight he has turned around the flagging organization. Thanks, Peter Angelos, for finally caring about your team. The American League East just isn’t competitive enough and now the perennial cellar-dwellers might be crawling back into competence.

Angelos had to do something to combat the ever-encroaching Washington Nationals. While franchise jewel Stephen Strasburg is on the shelf the rest of the season and slated for Tommy John surgery, Natstown fans do have Nyjer Morgan’s tomfoolery to enjoy.

Morgan makes Matt Garza look like an Eagle Scout and Delonte West appear to be a well-balanced individual. Speaking of, West will get another shot with the Celtics. Hopefully West knows that this doesn’t mean a literal shot from a gun.

Game 133: August 31, 2010
Red Sox 75-58	9	W: Jon Lester (15-8) S: Jonathan Papelbon (34)
		2B: David Ortiz (30), Ryan Kalish (4), Victor Martinez (28) HR: J.D. Drew (18), Marco Scutaro (8), Adrian Beltre (24)
Orioles 49-84	6	BS, L: Mark Hendrickson (2, 1-5)
		2B: Adam Jones (20), Felix Pie – 2 (12)

2 September 2010 ∙ 5:55 PM ∙ September 2010 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Beltre (Adrian) ∙ Orioles ∙ Scutaro (Marco) ∙ Showalter (Buck) ∙ West (Delonte)

Theo Epstein got into the spirit of the election year and gave some serious spin to the trading of Manny Delcarmen to the Rockies for minor league pitcher Chris Balcom-Miller. The Red Sox general manager said the move wasn’t a white flag of surrender, like how the furor over the Islamic center in lower Manhattan (a.k.a “the Ground Zero mosque”) isn’t about hypocrisy and hatred.

To be certain, Delcarmen has been pitching so terribly that removing him from the bullpen is a net positive, but since there was no major league piece coming in return clearly the team is geared to improving its future rather bolstering its current state. I should have been accepting of the team’s playoff chances when Kevin Youkilis went down and further inured myself to the inevitable course the season was taking when Dustin Pedroia succumbed to his foot injury, but these are the post-2004 Red Sox! Roaring back against the Yankees and also against Cleveland in 2007 has just unrealistically inflated my expectations of the franchise.

Recalling how emotional Nomar Garciaparra was about getting traded I can only imagine Delcarmen’s reaction. Nomar grew up as a baseball player in Boston just like Manny, but the latter was born and raised here was well. Good luck and godspeed in Colorado, Manny. I hear the humidor has done wonders for pitchers and it’s only National League hitters.

Speaking of Manny, another former Hub favorite has been making headlines of late. Manny Ramirez was claimed by the Chicago White Sox off waivers. His last at bat as a Dodger couldn’t have been more fitting if it were scribed by screenwriter: he was summoned to pinch hit with the bases loaded in the sixth and he was ejected after disputing Gary Cederstrom’s called strike. Perhaps the home plate umpire overreacted, but why argue balls and strikes when you know it can get you tossed?

Why have a translator when you speak and understand English?

Because your name is Manny Ramirez and all you care about is your next contract.

Game 132: August 31, 2010
Red Sox 74-58	2	L: Josh Beckett (4-4)
		2B: Bill Hall (10) HR: Jed Lowrie (4)
Orioles 49-83	5	W: Brian Matusz (7-12) H: Jim Johnson (4), Michael Gonzalez (6) S: Koji Uehara (5)
		2B: Nick Markakis (40) HR: Luke Scott (26), Felix Pie (5)

1 September 2010 ∙ 6:05 PM ∙ August 2010 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Delcarmen (Manny) ∙ Orioles ∙ Ramirez (Manny)

To distract myself from the dismal series loss against the Rays I watched “Last Day of the Dinosaurs,” a light-hearted romp through the end of the Cretaceous most likely precipitated by the Chicxulub Asteroid pummeling the Yucatan Peninsula. When the six-mile long bolide impacted Earth, dinosaurs were broiled alive by the heat, megatsunamis thousands of feet high surged across the planet, and sunlight was blocked from the earth for up to a year.

That got me to thinking about the Red Sox 2010 season.

Consider the 2004 World Championship the asteroid obliterating the plodding, lethargic negativity that dominated the landscape much like the dinosaurs. The cataclysmic occurrence may not have measured the 12.55 on the Richter scale that characterized the estimated seismic energy of Chicxulub, but it was nonetheless sizable. In the wake of Boston’s victory another ill-starred team, the Chicago White Sox, won its first championship in 88 years. And a mere three years later the Red Sox won another championship, overcoming a 3-1 game deficit against the Indians in the ALCS to trample the Rockies in the World Series.

For the Red Sox it was not possible to reuse the template for success. There was no need to rely on the lumbering sluggers in left any longer. Besides, Manny Ramirez quit on the team in 2008 and his replacement Jason Bay declined to re-sign with the Red Sox after the 2009 season. In 2010 the plan was to evolve the team to a philosophy of run prevention.

(John Lackey was part and parcel of that plan, but exactly how well he contributes remains in question. His reactions to his defenders’ gaffes certainly makes them wish to avoid errors.)

It boggles the mind to imagine how great this team could have been without the onslaught of injuries. If any two out of the essential troika of Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia, and Kevin Youkilis hadn’t missed playing time the Red Sox would be the apex predators of the AL East. Instead they are the opportunistic omnivores, snitching crumbs where they can to stockpile a modest store of wins.

In the last game of the series, on the eve of their extinction, the Red Sox could have made the bold leap from scrounger to hunter. But instead they were content to nibble on morsels of mediocrity.

Game 131: August 29, 2010
Red Sox 74-57	3	L: John Lackey (12-8)
		2B: Mike Lowell (10), Adrian Beltre (38)
Rays 80-50	5	W: James Shields (13-11) H: Randy Choate (14), Joaquin Benoit (23) S: Rafael Soriano (39)
		2B: Evan Longoria (42) HR: Carlos Pena (25), Carl Crawford (15)

30 August 2010 ∙ 6:30 PM ∙ August 2010 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Chicxulub ∙ Lackey (John) ∙ Rays

It’s not that our team doesn’t have smarts, it’s just that our team’s smarts are inconsistently used. Mike Lowell is widely regarded as particularly wily, so he knew that keeping Carlos Pena pegged at first with the bottom of the order coming wasn’t a priority.

But Clay Buchholz is the poster child for nervous throws over to first. His pickoffs are like Nomar’s pre-batting tics or Wade’s chicken dinners, except since they happen in-game they may cause mayhem. Pena didn’t even have a lead and Buchholz tossed over to first.

Lowell is wise the the ways of the game but at this point is so inert he has to flip to pitchers on many ground outs to his position. One game he is going to be at first and Wakes is going to be pitching and neither will make it to first in time to stop a Molina from getting an infield single. So Mikey couldn’t get to Clay’s errant throw and it gamboled through foul territory to the Rays bullpen. Carlos galloped all the way from first to third while J.D. and Mikey pawed through the equipment, chairs, and relievers that littered the area.

(Later Amalie Benjamin tweeted that the bench called for the pickoff. Sort of like how a dog owner will apologize to their neighbors when her dog does its business in their yards. But it’s not the dog’s fault, as it’s not Clay’s fault. He was just answering the call of his nature.)

J.D. got very familiar with the Rays bullpen area. Perhaps there something about the mingled scents of chewing tobacco, Bazooka, and Red Bull that compelled him to pursue Matt Joyce’s fly ball so fiercely. Drew deftly maneuvered through the furniture and bodies to snare the second out of the inning but had no chance throw Carlos out at home.

With the game knotted 1-1, Victor acted the big brother bailing out his little sibling when they got into a jam. His fifth homer as a lefty sailed into the right field seats and erased the seventh-inning mishaps.

The spirit of Grady Little stopped whittling wood or making moonshine or whatever it is up to these days to take over Tito Francona’s body in the eighth inning. In Little’s day the mantra was “Timlin in the eighth, Williamson in the ninth.” This has since been supplanted by “Bard in the eighth, Papelbon in the ninth.” This should be Tito’s motto, but instead it was replaced by “Let’s squeeze a few more pitches out of the ace.”

B.J. Upton caught hold of Clay’s hanging curve and the game was tied again. Wisps of Grady’s wisdom still collected in the corners of Tito’s mind like cobwebs. Scott Atchison, not Papelbon, pitched to Dan Johnson, the resistible force against the movable object. Thus the paradox was solved.

Great Plays We Knew We Were Making
I am remiss in mentioning Ryan Kalish’s astounding catch to end the second inning. The shot to center came ringing off of Upton’s bat, off all players. B.J. is not known for his hustle on the field, the antithesis of Kalish.

While B.J. was drafted in the first round of the 2002 draft and was much heralded, Kalish was tapped in the ninth round of the 2006 draft and thus came with somewhat diminished expectations. Perhaps that is what drives Kalish play like a hellion, throwing caution to the wind and his body about the FieldTurf.

Kalish bolted to Upton’s ball on the perfect route and gloved it with his body parallel to the ground. Rather than risking his ribs (Ellsbury take note) Kalish somersaulted sideways but missed a perfect score by a few tenths of a point by not sticking the dismount.

Game 129: August 27, 2010 ∙ 10 innings
Red Sox 74-56	2	L: Scott Atchison (2-2)
		2B: David Ortiz (29) HR: Victor Martinez (13)
Rays 79-50	3	W: Randy Choate (4-3)
		HR: B.J. Upton (13), Dan Johnson (2)

29 August 2010 ∙ 5:22 PM ∙ August 2010 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Buchholz (Clay) ∙ Drew (J.D.) ∙ Francona (Terry) ∙ Kalish (Ryan) ∙ Lowell (Mike) ∙ Rays

It was like the old days in the Trop last night: Red Sox fans were louder than the Rays supporters and the visiting team came away with the victory. The irony is that Boston devotees are indirectly supporting the Rays. This is because the revenue-sharing scheme in MLB has luxury tax-paying teams like the Red Sox forking over money to small market teams such as the Rays.

Compared to the Marlins and Pirates, the Tampa Bay franchise is the exemplar of how revenue-receiving teams should reinvest the funds they receive to improve on-field performance. As a follower of a team in the Rays’ division, however, I really would prefer that the Rays ownership were more like Bob Nutting and Jeffrey Loria.

Although I was reeling from the news that Dustin Pedroia would probably be out for the year his teammates soldiered on. Jon Lester twirled seven innings, allowed only two hits, and struck out ten. The game was in the balance in the sixth when walked B.J. Upton to start the sixth and then allowed a frozen rope off Jason Bartlett’s bat for a single to center. Upton didn’t go all out around the bases and was surprised to be waved home. Darnell McDonald fired a seed to Victor Martinez, who was in perfect position to block Upton from scoring. Unfortunately the collision wasn’t hard enough to knock off Upton’s cheesy mustache.

Lester’s command was poor throughout the game but he used his guile against the free-swinging Rays. After the out at home Lester uncorked a wild pitch to Carlos Pena that allowed Bartlett to advance to second. Pena worked a free pass but Lester battled back to strike out Evan Longoria and induce a ground out to short from Willy Aybar.

As if he were acutely aware of his battery mate’s extraordinary effort, Martinez came through with two bombs to left field. Prior to launching his second home run Martinez tarried before stepping into the box. David Price countered by taking a stroll around the back of the mound. The showdown reminded me off how another Martinez, Pedro, would toy with batters. The tactic didn’t quite work for Price.

The only other visitor to drive in a run was Pedroia’s replacement, Jed Lowrie, who dropped a single just out of reach of Bartlett in the fourth to plate David Ortiz. Soon Lowrie will be spouting off about his laser shows, except for him that means the laser pointer he uses when he is alter ego: Jed Lowrie, financial analyst.

Four and a half.

Game 129: August 27, 2010
Red Sox 74-55	3	W: Jon Lester (14-8) H: Daniel Bard (29) S: Jonathan Papelbon (33)
		2B: David Ortiz (28) 3B: Darnell McDonald (3) HR: Victor Martinez – 2 (12)
Rays 78-50	1	L: David Price (15-6)
		No extra base hits.

28 August 2010 ∙ 3:54 PM ∙ August 2009 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Lester (Jon) ∙ Lowrie (Jed) ∙ Martinez (Victor) ∙ McDonald (Darnell) ∙ Rays