John Lackey: Good Enough, I Guess

I'm exhausted today. Don't know why, but I didn't sleep very well last night, so I'm going to make this really short and painless for all involved. Instead of my usual 1000-word ramblings about whatever strikes my little mind, I'm breaking yesterday down in to a few cute, quick bullet points. You'll have to forgive my slackerhood, but I just can't muster much in terms of comprehensive thought. Ok, here we go!

-John Lackey wasn't good. He was actually very frustrating to watch, especially in the early innings. Getting a win doesn't make you good, and it doesn't give me faith in you.
-Gonzo, my shortstop binky, was robbed of a home run. I don't know, I saw that replay over and over and I'm pretty sure it cleared the line (and even if it didn't... again, he's my Binky. I don't care). If it were anyone else, I wouldn't have minded. Because it was Gonzo, I was mad for him. He ended up scoring anyway.
-BOP closed the game for Lackey... though yesterday they were OBP... but accounting for how few baserunners they allowed collectively, they were probably the opposite of OBP.
-VMart continues to frustrate me with his inability to not ground into double plays or potential double plays. Blue Jay's terrible fielding and his single and 3 RBI's were his saving graces. I've got my eye on you, Martinez. Cut the shit.
-Papi got a hit and an RBI. That is good by my standards for him. Because I love Papi.
-JD is suffering from vertigo again. That honestly sucks. Being uncontrollably dizzy is a horrible thing.
-Josh Beckett got pushed back, so again, Tito tweaking the rotation has assured I will not see Beckett when I head out to Fenway. Tito does this to me a LOT. Ugh.
-BUT, that does mean that Wakey gets moved back to the rotation. Perhaps it has something to do with him stealing handwarmers from his fellow bullpen pirates?
-Back up over .500 for Dice-K. Can I cover my eyes again?

See? See how adorable those were. Ok, back to caffeine and school work. My life is exciting.

Manny Delcarmen: Now Our Best Pitcher

A week ago, I declared to some friends that Manny was not long for this team. But after last night's debacle, I am now declaring him safe. Two scoreless innings. It was brilliant and so very needed.

If you didn't watch last night's suck-fest, consider yourself lucky. There was a lot of suck on behalf of our pitchers. I don't even know if I can call them pitchers. Last night, Josh was a mere thrower. There was no pitching involved after the second inning. Which is funny, because he didn't last much past the second inning. And he still managed to give up eight runs. There are probably only a handful of people in the world who don't know Josh personally who are as big of fans of him as I am. Or maybe there are thousands. What do I know? I base my opinions off of information I have readily available to me. Anyway. While I didn't expect Beckett to have a great season, because it is an even-numbered year, I would like him to pull back on the suck just a little. Like, maybe he could not have an ERA over 7. Maybe he needs to set the damn example for the rest of our starters, being the official ace and all. NESN showed a breakdown of our starting rotation after the game last night. Let's just say this: It makes the Pirates pitching staff look pretty good right about now. Our starters... all five of them... have something like 2 wins combined. I get it; it's not all their fault. Offense and bullpen problems can lead to not getting wins. But pitching like garbage also leads to not getting wins. It all starts with Josh. He needs to be the first to pull his shit together, and then maybe the others will follow.

As far as the bullpen goes, Atchinson did well enough. No, he didn't do well, but he did well enough. Schoe... um... 1/3rd of an inning, 1 run allowed. Not good enough for me, but good enough to get that illusive "W," so who am I to complain? Oki... Jesus, Tito, give this dude a break. He didn't get a single out and still managed to give up two runs. THAT was ugly. That was Beckett bad. He's clearly exhausted. Bard.... meh. He was average, but I'm figuring he's just as exhausted as Oki. Paps, thankfully, was good and he didn't give us that one last heart attack at the end of the game. He'll never know how much I appreciated that. But Manny D... I'll tell ya, we needed that. We really did. So how does everyone thing Rambo felt? Being literally the only reliever that Tito did not use last night? Has to tell him something, I'd imagine.

Now, for the good part... the offense. We had offense! We had TONS of offense, finishing with 18 hits and 13 runs. My Captain... my dearest, darling Jason was able to hit TWICE with the bases loaded. There was a long period of time (think every year before right now) that Jason would see the bases loaded and panic, and more often than not strike out on a high fastball. Not last night. Last night, he knocked in his first four non-solo-home-run RBI's of the season, and finished the night with three hits. Sure, the two AB's that he didn't hit, he struck out, but I'm so incredibly happy with his performance. That's the kind of Captain we need. He was awesome. Maybe could have called a better game, but I'm just going to lay the blame solely on our pitching staff.

We ended up with five batters having three hits of the night. The only slot in our lineup that didn't have a hit was the number 8 spot. Bill Hall and Wolverine combined for 0 hits, 2 strikeouts, and one walk in five total AB's. You'll never hear me say this again, but Mikey Lowell was probably the biggest disappointment of the night. If he had just gotten one timely hit, this game wouldn't have come down to one run (at least I'm assuming it wouldn't). In six AB's, he got one hit and no RBI's. Mikey left eight men on base. Not that I think Papi would have done much better, but I'm sorry Mike, that wasn't good enough. Even JD ".182" Drew had an RBI. This team was 11 for 20with RISP... and... I'm not going to complain about the offense. It was there. It saved us.

Youk, of course, had to be the one to get hit by a pitch. He's ok, but why does everyone target Youk? It's the beard, isn't it? It's scary, and they just want to conquer their fears. Anyhow... 2 SB's for Munchkin (also one of the members of the 3-hit club). Munchkin, of course, was our little spark-plug. As usual. Without Pedroia, there is no game.

I don't know what else I can say about this game. From a pitching standpoint, it was downright horrifying. From an offense standpoint, no one should complain... except perhaps Blue Jays fans. But I'm not a Blue Jays fan, so I don't care.

Also, congratulations to the Bruins in advancing to the second round of the playoffs as a result of a very exciting game that was a great distraction for me while the Sox pitching staff was making me want to rip my hair out. Way to go!

Lackey: Getting A Win

Another game that just wasn't pretty to watch. Lackey lasted 7 innings, but I wouldn't even dare venture to say that any of those innings were relaxing. He allowed 3 runs on ten (10!) hits, giving up 2 walks and getting 3 strikeouts. It's the Orioles. The Orioles probably hadn't had ten hits in all their other games for the entire week before this game. They ended up finishing the game with an absurd 17 hits, making our measley 9 hits look even more pathetic. Usually in a game where you have nine hits, you feel good about it. But when you get outhit, by almost double your hit total, by a team that only has two wins to call their own for the month of April, you start to wonder if perhaps the pride is unjustified. I don't know. All I know is that Lackey and Lester are both still sporting ERA's over 5. I don't care how discredited the good ol' ERA has become. It's still a big, garish number that you have to look at, and it still shows you on average how many runs you can expect your starter to surrender. We're almost at the point where the sample sizes are large enough to actually give you a decent indication of how our pitching is doing. They're, in a word, crappy. But there is room and time for improvement, so I'll just keep that with me and bury all of my hopes into it.

On the plus side, my darling Jason hit his fourth home run of the season. He's batting over .300 on the year. In 23 AB's, Jason has 7 hits. Four of them are home runs. All of those home runs are solo shots. What, no one can get on base in front of him? I know this pace isn't going to keep up, but it makes me really happy for right now. Any time I get to see Jason on my screen, I will refrain from complaining. And as much as I want to like Victor Martinez and I want him to succeed, I don't think he's going to be around for the long haul. The Red Sox are targeting catchers left and right. We need someone who can throw out base runners, and it's clear that Jason and Victor aren't big on that. Tek has allowed 11 SB's, and caught no one. Victor has allowed 27 SB's and caught 2 runners. 38 SB's off Red Sox catchers in APRIL! Ugh, that just gave me a stomach ache. Let's not think about that any more.

So the Sox put up 7 runs on three home runs. Tek's was obviously a solo shot. Scutaro got hold of a pitch for a three run blast in the 7th, and Youk followed up with his own three run shot in the same inning. We were a whole 2 for 4 with RISP. Doesn't exactly make you feel good knowing that all the offense came directly from home runs, but at the same time, I'll never complain about a home run. Wolverine did have an error in this game, but what's a Sox game with no errors by our defense? Boring, that's what it is!

Oh! That's right, I don't want to forget... a GIANT welcome back to Vantastic. He was dumped by the Pirates and picked back up by the Sox. When I tell you I love this kid, you can believe that I truly love him. I don't know what it is about itty bitty baby Sox outfielders, but I think I have a soft spot in my heart for them. It's fine. I'm happy that he's back, even if he didn't do much in terms of adding value to the ball club on Saturday night. He'll come in handy as CRW continues to recover from his fractured ribs. I know that Vantastic can field, at least. And every once in a while, he has been known to pop up with a much needed hit, so there's that. I love getting to welcome people back. Time to update the nickname list!

Then there's the bullpen. Oh, bullpen. I'll give them their dues. They were superb during the Rangers series. They went a good long while without allowing a run between them all. BOP was almost unhittable during that series. Unfortunately, starting Friday night, they were pretty damn hittable. In a total of two innings that the pen had to work, we had three relievers. Rambo actually took the biggest hit to his ERA, but Paps was the one that allowed the hits that caused those runs to score. There were five straight hits in the ninth. Schoe was great in the 2/3rds of an inning he was allowed to pitch. After getting the first out in the 9th, Rambo gave up a HR and a double and was lifted for Pap. Pap allowed the next three batters to reach on singles. I was ripping my hair out, as I'm sure you guessed. Finally, Farrell came out, smacked Paps in the head and told him to cut the shit*, after which he promptly and excruciatingly retired the next two batters via strikeout. Damage done, though, as two batters had already come around to score. I don't know what gets into Paps sometimes, but that many hits to the Orioles? Ugly. Just glad he got out of it.

*Disclaimer: This has never actually happened, but it's the only thing I want to see John Farrell do before he retires. Come on! It would be so damn funny! And probably effective!

So that was Saturday. Again, a win is a win. Doesn't matter if it's ugly. Unfortunately, ugly catches up with you eventually. When I can stomach it, I'll write about Sunday's game. It may take me until the start of tonight's game, but I'll do it. I promise! Have I ever lied to you? Sure I have, but you guys don't care. You're good troopers!

Dahmer: Killing The Competition Till The 7th

It's insensitive and incredibly difficult to try to come up with serial killer related puns every time Dahmer takes the mound, but I'm committed because I care. I'll give him credit. He pitched better than any of our other starters had for a long while. Six scoreless innings is more than I could have hoped to ask for. And he was efficient, which is even better. Ten K's and only 1 BB usually makes for a pretty good outing. Unfortunately, this great pitching performance leads to two not-great results. The first being that we still lost the game because CJ Wilson was just that much better. The offense decided that they needed a break, and we lost three to nothing. Oh well, at least we won the series.

The second not-great result is that Wake is being kicked out of the rotation. I don't entirely think this is permanent, because I'm pretty confident that Dice is going to reinjure himself at some point in the season, so Wakey will get his spot back. It just really stinks that in Tim's quest to win 18 more measley games (a quest which started with him pretty much stabbing himself in the foot, I guess), he's getting banished to bullpen land. On the plus side, those crazy pirates out there have needed some leadership since the Admiral left town. He can't be the admiral, and we already have a captain and a commander. Perhaps Tim would like to take on the role of lieutenant? I can't imagine that anyone out there is higher ranking than officer anyway.

Of course, with Dice set on the path for return, who goes down? You're not going to lose anyone in the trinity of BOP (Bard, Oki, Paps).... yes, I just called them the trinity of BOP. BOP is their collective name. Hey, I like acronyms, ok? You've got Atchinson, Schoeneweiss, Rambo, and Delcarmen. My money is on the Sox claming Manny is injured and sending him away, but it's more likely that they'll dump Schoe or Atchinson. Sad but true. We'll see what happens. Can't get rid of any bench players. We need those guys.

Also... how did the Sox miss the fact (for over a WEEK!) that CRW had four fractured ribs? That's not exactly something that I feel they should be missing.

Anyway. As someone who loves great pitching, I really did enjoy watching the game last night. I would have enjoyed it more if the outcome had been favorable for us. So I give credit where credit is due. Toight, on the other hand.... if we don't win tonight, I don't care if it's a score of 1-0, I won't be happy with it. There is NO excuse for losing to a team like the Orioles. They're the types of teams we're supposed to feast on to build up our strength before taking on teams with winning records. Frighteningly enough, even if we win all three games, we're still walking away with a less than .500 winning pct. 6 and 10 to start the season. Lord, I did not expect this. Neither did anyone else, I'm sure. But even though it's only April, it's time to start winning series, if not going for the full sweep. Tampa's at 12 wins. We have exactly half of that. We're supposed to be one of the three big powers in this division, not one of the two bottom-feeders. Time to start clawing out before it's too late. Got that Lester? No more of your ridiculously shenanigans. We really need you to be sharp tonight. Super sharp. Don't suck. That's an order.

It'll be a good night for sports-watching if you're a Boston fan. Sox are opening aforementioned series with the O's, the Bruins will be in Buffalo for game five... a game that if they win will send them to round 2 of the playoffs. The Celts are in Miami for game three with a series lead of 2-0. Let's hope that we get at least a few wins out of tonight.... but if I had to pick only one, I'd go with the Bruins. C's and Sox have won recently. Let's give the Bruins some luck. Let's go Bruins!