Scutaro Saves The Giants: And Other Thoughts That Annoy Me

Marco Scutaro was the NLCS MVP.

Josh Reddick won a gold glove.

John Farrell is the new manager.

The first two annoy me because they won awards for other teams when they should have still been on our team. Give me one reason other than payroll that Scutaro was traded away. I LIKED Scutaro. He was one of the few who didn't quit in September 2011. And Reddick? There was just no reason to trade him. Who the hell did we get? Bailey? I don't want Bailey. Give me back Reddick!

Guys, this infuriates me. Instead of asking why can't we get players like that, I ask why we don't keep players like that? Why get rid of Reddick? Why trade Scoots when we clearly don't have a shortstop. Oh, I'm sorry... Nick Punto was the shortstop, right? Fantastic.

And Farrell? I don't have faith in a single person that our front office lusts after. They have a horrifying track record of lusting after the wrong man for the job. Lugo. Renteria. Dice K. Drew. Lackey. Failures. And John's record in Toronto leaves me nothing to feel warm and fuzzy about.

Maybe it's just me, but I'm finding it very hard to feel positive about this team for any reason. Just sign David Ortiz and give me a reason to give you my money, Red Sox. All I want is one damn reason.

And Bobby V. is an asshat. I don't need to justify. I just think he's an asshat.

So, here's what I think our lineup will look like next season:

Jacoby Ellsbury - CF - for the first ten games of the season until he breaks himself. To be replaced with random outfielder or infielder from Pawtucket and/or the local Quick Stop.

Dustin Pedroia - 2B
David Ortiz - DH
Amadeus Saltalamacchia -C
Who - 1B
I don't know - 3B

At about this point of the lineup card, fans are randomly selected from the crowd to take the field.

We clearly don't have a SS. I don't think we have any legitimate outfielders left... Loney isn't coming back to play 1B. I guess Middlebrooks might be on 3rd, but we'll see if he gets healthy.

Don't even ask about the pitching. It's just slightly more terrifying than the worst zombie movie you've ever seen.

Happy Halloween, everyone. Any chance the Red Sox pull some treats out for their loyal (and cranky) fanbase, or do they just keep assaulting us with tricks?

Gone, Bobby, Gone

More official things... Valentine has been canned.

Now he doesn't have to worry about a sneaky, scheming bunch of coaches. He can focus on coming up with the next big sandwich craze. Good luck,  Bobby. Seriously. I don't blame you for all of this, you were just the wrong person for the job.

I'd say we can let the healing begin now, but I'm afraid we've got a long couple of years ahead of us, folks.

Thanks: And Goodbye 2012 Sox

It is now officially over. My team laid down and got sexually assaulted by the Yankees for the last three games in a row, putting their end of season losing streak at 8 games to finish out the year.

Thanks to everyone who came by the blog this year and read my whining. I know there was a lot of whining, and a lot of sadness, but your visits cheer me up.

Congratulations and good luck to all the teams that made the playoffs... except the Yankees. F@!K the Yankees.

I hope everyone on the current roster is shipped to the Zimbabwe fall league this year, never to return. I'm glad to hear rumors that Bobby will be fired soon. It doesn't make me feel better, I'm just glad to hear it. And if somehow, in some terrible-miracle sort of way he manages to come back? I am turning in my Sox hat and going to live in a bomb shelter under a mountain somewhere. Listen to me, Lucchino! I do NOT want to live in a bomb shelter!

In what should have been a giant party all year long, celebrating the 100th anniversary of the park I love so much, there was just misery. We finished in last place, we lost the voice and the heart of the team (Rest well, Johnny and Carl), AND we handed the division to our rivals. On a silver platter, served on the backs of our pitching staff.

Can I call them pitchers? Throwers, maybe. These guys can't pitch.

So I hope when they clean out the lockers, the names that currently hang above them are never replaced. We clearly need some new blood on this team.

Also, I'll be DAMNED if this team gives Pretzels $100M. We've had enough of those kinds of mistakes.

So there you have it. A miserably, whiny post to conclude a miserable whiny season. I look forward to the winter and to watching how this team is disassembled and then put back together. Listen guys, even if next season is worse that this one, it at least won't hurt so badly, because we're ready for it. Enjoy cheap tickets at Fenway!

I'll see you all during the winter meetings.

It's Over: It's BEEN Over.

This season is like a never-ending train wreck. The horror just continues rolling along, and we are powerless to stop it, or look away.

There is no joy in the team. The manager is defeated, and quite frankly sounds like he yearns for retirement. The play on the field is flat. If you thought they were slumping from April-July, just get a load of their numbers in August. This team has been in a giant, collective slump all season, and they don't know how to pull themselves out of it.

It's a train wreck.. I feel no joy in watching it. I feel no compulsion to write about it. Like they always say, if you can't say something nice...

Every day, my Sox fandom looks itself in the mirror, straightens its navy blue "B" hat, sighs and announces we're still in for the long run. And we are. But we don't have to like it.

I'm taking solace in the fact that Keebler has the entire offseason to put his own stamp on the team. So far, he's traded away Youk, Shoppach, Beckett, Gonzalez, Crawford, and Punto, and essentially got back a diet soda with a loose lid from Wendy's. I don't know how much faith I have in his trade-making skills, but I have no choice but to go with it. For the record, I still feel a little numb about the trade, considering Beckett was my favorite pitcher for years and years. Also, I'm disappointed that Keebs stripped us of the chance to ever see a healthy Crawford play - but there's no guarantee that there would ever BE a healthy Crawford.

Also, Sauce? ENOUGH. Either shut your damn mouth or get off my team. There's enough negative feeling around the Sox without you being an asshole crybaby.

Twenty-plus more games to play, and it's looking more and more likely that this team will finish under .500 and in last place. I'm afraid to hope for change, because I don't know how much worse it can get. All I can do is try to shield my eyes from the carnage.

That being said.... go Sox.

The Rage: One Step Further

Done.

I am done with you, Jon Lester. And you, Josh Beckett. You self important assholes.

I harbor no more love for you, Dustin Pedroia. You don't even deserve the honor of a stupid nickname any more.

Jacoby Ellsbury. Adrian Gonzales. What more important things did you have to do?

Our ENTIRE outfield! Not a SINGLE ONE of you could bother? The ENTIRE infield? Were you too busy getting spiffed up for the Beckett Bowl?

I am so disgusted. I don't care what's going on with the team. I don't care that you had a charity event to go to THAT NIGHT. I don't even care if you don't like funerals. You entitled little crybabies should have shut up, put on a suit, and gone to Pesky's funeral.

It disgusts me enough that they allowed all of you to wear his number. You couldn't be bothered to win a single game that you played in his honor. You couldn't bother to show up for the games that coincided with the Jimmy Fund Telethon. You. Didn't. Try.

Big Papi, Amadeus (who, by the way, managed attendance at both events), Dahmer, and Padilla... thank you. Thank you for being professionals, and good people, and showing up to a funeral that most people in New England would have loved to have been able to attend.

As for the rest of you? You're dead to me. You are not men.

It's going to be a quiet night at the ballpark for me tonight.

Babies In The Dugout: Anger In My Heart

It is becoming increasingly hard for me to separate my love for the Red Sox with my hatred of the players on this team. I'm not being reactionary. Not a single one of them deserves to wear that uniform.

I hate buying into what the media tells me to think about these guys. Really, I do. But with the reports that seventeen players had a meeting with ownership behind Bobby's back, I'm done supporting the players. They make me angry. A bunch of whiny, overindulged babies who don't like that the manager has expectations for them? Aw, poor them. Hey, I didn't like that Bobby left Jon Lester out that night to get pounded either (mostly because he was making the game unenjoyable for me), but it's Lester's goddamn JOB to pitch, and when we have no one left in the bullpen, either take your lumps or PITCH BETTER.

I feel no sympathy for them. I have no respect for them. And the ownership that allows them to be crybabies is just as bad. Let me clarify - I don't have anything against the ownership. For as long as they've been in charge, things have seemed pretty good around Fenway. I think they made the wrong decision to hire Bobby in the offseason, but once you hire him, he's your guy. Support him, and see to it that the employees under him don't feel like they have power to veto him. He's a manager. The fact that they didn't let him manage if a failure on their part, and they have to be held accountable for the millionaire monsters they've created.

We wanted these guys to win one for Pesky? Please, I don't even want them associated with the name Johnny Pesky. Their entitled bullshit attitudes are the opposite of everything Pesky stood for. There is no honor in having these guys win a game for a person that they didn't even deserve to be around.

Yup, I'm talking to all of them - Beckett, Lester, Pedroia, Ellsbury, Gonzalez... You name 'em, I'm disgusted by them. There is no leadership among the players. Or if there is, the only thing that's being led is a  march up to the owner's office to whine that Bobby made them feel bad. Suck it up, you jackasses. You don't want to play for Bobby? Too goddamn bad. It's not your decision. You signed your name to those contracts and it's your RESPONSIBILITY to earn that money.

This season has been painful. That game last night? Hideous. I have no good good things to say about the team. I have no happy or warm feelings about any of the games on the rest of the schedule. And it kills me to say that I don't like this team, because I truly and honestly did like them at the beginning of the season. But they have no heart, no fight, no desire. A new manager isn't going to change that. We got a new manager. Remember, they managed to get Tito fired and it didn't improve their desire to win at all. The change has to come from ownership. The next time they get a text message crying that Bobby hurt someone's feelings, instead of calling a meeting to let the players cry, they should tell them to take their frustrations out in the work out room and the batting cages.

That being said, I'm still in it. And unlike a lot of people I know, I want them to win. I just don't think they will. So go Sox.... you've got a month and a half left. Start earning your paychecks.

And the baseball world gets a little smaller

Earlier this season, we lost the voice of Fenway when Carl Beane died.

Yesterday, we lost the heart of the Red Sox with the passing of Johnny Pesky.

Despite knowing that he couldn't possibly live forever, I didn't think the end would come this soon. My heart is broken. I'm sure many, many people can relate when I say I felt like Johnny Pesky was my grandfather.

Johnny always had a minute to spare for anyone who wanted one. I met him on a few occasions, and he was always wonderful and accommodating. Johnny once said that his autograph was worth about ten cents, and maybe he's right about that. The autograph may be worth ten cents, but the experience of getting to talk to him for even two minutes was priceless.

I cried when I heard. I always wondered what I would do when Johnny passed away. I didn't expect that the answer would be 'bawl like a giant baby and mess up dinner because I just couldn't properly roll arancini through my grief.' Dinner came out ok despite my inability to roll risotto, but it tasted sad. If you can taste the love put into a meal, you can taste the sadness behind it as well.

My boyfriend laughed at me last night. Maybe he was right to. I probably looked ridiculous sitting on the couch, clutching a tissue, with tears rolling down my cheeks as I watched the NESN special on Johnny. He said he didn't understand why I was getting so upset over the death of someone I didn't even know. I told him he didn't have to understand, he just had to accept.

It eases my grief a little that the last game Johnny attended was a win. Also knowing that he got to play such a prominent part in both the 100th anniversary celebration, Opening Day, and the World Series victories. I am thankful that the Red Sox officially declared the right field pole "Pesky's Pole" and retired his old number 6 while he was still around to see it. I don't think anyone loved the Red Sox, Fenway, or baseball more than Johnny Pesky, and now no one can ever separate Fenway and Johnny. His name, his fingerprints, his stories are all over that park.

Johnny, if there is a ball park in the afterlife, I honestly hope to see you there. And if I do, I suspect that you will be sitting in a folding chair, signing autographs and telling stories. Rest in peace, dear man. You are loved and missed.