Big Papi: Can Still Blast Off When Needed

Yes, folks. On Friday night, David Ortiz blasted his first home run of the season. Say what you will about the man (but not in front of me or I'll get angry), but his home runs are always just fantastic. The fact that he CAN hit home runs, especially off a guy like Guthrie who is actually a decent pitcher (not a good one, a decent one)is a good sign. It took Mr. Ortiz a month longer last year to get the home run swing back. This time, sure, there's more to lose for him if he doesn't succeed. It's a contract year. There are replacements for him in the form of the fantastic Mr. Lowell. Not many people have been as big a fan of David Ortiz around these parts lately. I'll always support him. I'm glad to know there are still plenty out there that will do the same. It's just a shame to see how many people jumped straight off his bandwagon. Overall, the big man was able to make it on base twice on Friday. Once on the home run, once on a walk. Whenever he walks, it's a good sign. It means he's laying off bad pitches! And if you saw the pitch sequence he had walked on.... there was no way any of those pitches were deserving of a swing anyway, but still. Of course, the best part of his performance on Friday.... ZERO strikeouts. That's what I like to see!

Lester was good. Finally. Yeah, if he hadn't been able to pitch well against the Orioles, I don't know what I would have done. They're the Orioles. They're barely a major league team at this point! But Johnny gave us five and two thirds, zero runs and seven strikeouts. I'm going to ignore the four walks, because that's horrible to think about. His BB/K ratio is all out of control early on this season, and his ERA is frightening, but I will take any good news that I can from his performance and look forward to his next start. Hopefully, he'll be able to beat his Friday start. I'm thinking maybe seven innings? That would have been nice, huh? Let's see on Wednesday what he can do.

Before I forget... my most sincere apology to the Bruins. I promise I will not write down any more of my hopes and dreams when it comes to hockey this year, because apparently the Bruins didn't appreciate me doing that. So, I'll leave you to your game, B's.

As for our 'pen... the pirates were not so sharp. Yes, Bard came in with the bases loaded in the sixth to relieve Jon Lester, and he was able to get the out. But in the next inning, he surrendered a 2-run shot. Oki and Delcarmen combined to ruin the game for the rest of us. If only by the grace of God, Adrian Beltre walked with the bases loaded in the eighth inning to give us our one-run lead back. That was all it would take. Trust me when I say that it was not a comfortable game. It shouldn't have been that hard, but it was a win and I'll take a win any way we can get it. Seeing our pirates struggle against the Orioles? Well, that's ugly. Thankfully, baseball aint supposed to be pretty. No style points, as they say.

So that was that. Our losing streak stopped at one game. We denied the O's their third win of the season, and we crept closer to .500. It's kind of sad when your goal is to see your really expensive baseball team get to .500, but that's where we're at. I'm going to get to the other games this past weekend, I just need some time.