Premature Exasperation: Homestand Rekindles Hope

4.22.03  No word yet on whether John Burkett will attend this year's All-Star Game if he's named to the team.

Just kidding, J.B. We pretty much knew what we were getting at the back of the rotation: lots of baserunners, lots of rockets, lots of long relief. So it's never a surprise when Burkett or Casey Fossum fails to go six or seven.

But there were certainly some pleasant surprises on this 7-2 homestand. (Reader warning: Hench about to be positive. Okay, largely positive.)

Weren't we all amazed at how good an ugly uniform can look during a comeback win? When the Red Devils gathered at home plate to welcome Nomar after his Saturday walk-off shot they looked positively resplendent. Of course overcoming a 5-0 deficit against an All-Star ace could make Padre mustard and brown look good. Sure, the red shirts look like batting practice jerseys, but they're damn purty when the Sox start taking BP in the late innings.

Shea Hillenbrand is amazing. Can you imagine how hard it is to hit Major League pitching when you lack the fundamental ability to gauge the path of a pitched ball? When the ball leaves the pitcher's hand, some hitters can tell immediately that that pitch will be in the dirt or way outside. With Shea, it's like he picks the ball up ten feet from home plate and reacts, which makes his hitting that much more phenomenal. This guy can go down on one knee and drive the ball to a gap or dive out over the plate and slap the ball down the right-field line. If the strike zone was the size of a soccer goal, the former All-State striker would be the best player in the game this side of Vlad Guerrero. Shea has been more patient this year, but not necessarily more selective (if that makes any sense). He takes pitches for the sake of taking pitches, not because they look like balls to him. As a result, he is often down in the count, but it hardly matters because he is such a wizard when it comes to hitting bad pitches hard. But more than his typical April offensive output, I've been so impressed with his defense. He made several superior plays at third this past week, including a dazzling 5-u-4 double play on which he made a strong throw to second while fading away into foul territory. It was an aggressive, confident play. Now, seriously, trade him for a pitcher already.

Though it is a confounding puzzlement why Nomar's throws seem to be so much more accurate on spectacular plays than on the routine ones, his play on Aubrey Huff in the Ice Bowl series against the D-Rays belongs in his all-time top 10. To go that far to his right and make that strong a throw in those conditions, well, you just have to tip your ski mask to him. Now if we could only eliminate those nasty splitters he throws after scooping balls hit right at him.

At the risk of calling attention to it, jinxing it and bringing down the whole freakin' house of cards, have you noticed that you're starting to expect Manny to make plays in left field? That you no longer hold your breath on every ball hit his way? That you're not even that shocked when he makes a running, lunging catch? Not enough was made of his barehand snag, spin and throw that preserved the first win at Baltimore. Why am I already regretting this paragraph?

Mike Timlin looks sharp. He's been challenging hitters with the same moxie that a bumper sticker above his locker taunts peaceniks. It describes the peace symbol as "The footprint of the American chicken." I wonder if Jason Varitek is reluctant to call for a curve for fear of misinterpretation. (Apparently glib comparisons between our Committee and H.U.A.C. were more accurate than we'd thought.) Just keep getting ahead in the count, Mike.

Tim Wakefield is a stud. If his stuff is crap, he finds a way to keep us in the game. If his stuff is awesome, he spends the whole day looking at the back of his catcher and he still finds a way to keep us in the game. If you could teach mound demeanor, Wake 101 would be a required course.

Kevin Millar announced himself with a game-winning home run in the second game of the season, and despite a 1-for-14 slide to end the homestand, he is rightly the fan favorite of the moment. He is a patient, professional hitter with power who also looks like our best fielder in the first baseman starting rotation (faint praise, to be sure). And he is clearly a great teammate. Watching him maul Nomar on Saturday was a joy.

And you can't love Millar without giving Theo Epstein his due. He refused to let alienating other GMs or prohibitive international long distance charges keep him from getting his man. The bullpen's recent run of success probably hasn't calmed the palpitations across New England - and beyond - and does anyone really believe Kevin Tolar and Jason Shiell are longterm solutions? But Millar has justified the Kid's doggedness and the team's offseason phone bill.

I would like to say something nice about Trot Nixon's hot start, but the Leo Durocher in me won't let me until he goes a whole week without airmailing the cutoff man.

Oh, and Grady... well, he didn't screw anything up too bad.

Now, please Lord, for the love of dinosaurs and moon landings, don't let Carl Everett beat us. In fact, for the sake of the Nation, don't even let the reigning AL Player of the Week come up against the Committee with the game on the line. Thanks.

By Any Acronym, These Guys Stink

4.9.03 TORONTO - Severe Acute Relief Shortcomings.  Sorry Ass Relief Stiffs.  Specialty: Allowing Runs Scored.  Suffering Another Routine Shelling.

Make up your own inappropriate meaning for SARS.  It's about the only fun to be had with this sorry bunch.  Here in the North American capital of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, it's perfectly fitting that we all have trouble breathing when Grady Little signals the pen to Summon Awful Retreaded Spares.

How bad is it? After last night's loss in which he gave up his second two-run homer of the young season, Alan Embree said, "I can live with the solo shots."  Really?  Well, there's the closer's mentality we're looking for. That's what you want a guy thinking as he strides in to slam the door:  I gotta limit them to solo homers!

For Red Sox fans, the entrance of Messrs. Embree, Howry, Timlin, Mendoza or Fox triggers Sudden Acid Reflux Sickness.

The scariest part is that none of these guys has actually been asked to work out of a difficult spot.  Embree melted down Opening Day in the cushiest of all possible save situations, three-run lead, bases empty, D-Rays batting.  Howry couldn't solve Rey Ordonez.  Mendoza barely held a five-run lead against the light-hitting O's.  Fox followed his own Opening Day collapse with another remarkable feat:  walking Tony Batista to force in the winning run.  At season's end, the collective OBP of the guys slapping our Sorry Anti Relief System around will be about .300.  If you can't get Rey Ordonez out, what's going to happen against Magglio Ordonez? 

While another poor outing by the bloodblistered D-Lowe is reason for concern, the blistering of our beaten and bloodied bullpen is the bigger problem.  I love Bill James, his abstract is the King James Bible of baseball.  I like Theo Epstein, he's bright, informed and desperately wants to win.  I even liked most of these pitching acquisitions, pre-Theo and after.  But Bobby Howry does not look like the pitcher he was in Chicago.  Chad Fox has clearly not returned to his pre-injury self (and we don't want him building his arm back up on our time via losses to weak teams).  Alan Embree looks less like that dominant power pitcher that was untouchable for a stretch late last summer and more like the journeyman that six teams have given up on.  Ramiro Mendoza looks every bit like the pitcher who has surrendered over a hit an inning in six of his seven years in the bigs and was touched for a .275 OBA last year.  He came up with a 1 6 4 4 0 0 line against the Orioles, and you thought that other Mendoza line was ugly.  And Mike Timlin is in his "decline phase" to use a Bill James term. 

So, kudos to the Kid for being inventive, but while thinking outside the box is great, thinking outside the boxscore is now unacceptable.  And it's time to start remedying the problem.  Prediction:  If the Red Sox obtain a closer, even a shaky one like Armando Benitez, the rest of these guys will pitch better.  

If they do nothing, just consider it Sacrificing Another Regular Season.

Panic Now, Beat the Rush

4.7.03: As I was chewing my nails down to the quick in the top of the ninth inning of Saturday's 2-1 loss to the Orioles, my phone rang. 

To my surprise, the plaintive voice on the other end was not a fellow Red Sox fan, but rather that of a Mets fan who had confidently included Pedro Martinez on a three-team parlay.

"What the hell is he doing?" my bewildered buddy asked, echoing the question I myself was screaming at the screen.

With nobody out and runners on first and third courtesy of the spectacularly wild Jorge Julio, Grady Little had Bill Mueller attempt a straight sacrifice to move the runner on first into scoring position.  Here was a pitcher who was struggling mightily to register a single strike and Grady was offering him an entire out. I couldn't believe it. Julio was throwing almost 100 miles an hour with movement and was all over the place and our idiot skipper puts on the bunt. I know Grady Little didn't play in The Show, but he did play baseball at some point in his life, right?  Yet clearly, in that moment, ninth inning of a one-run game - that familiar setting where he does his worst work - Grady clearly couldn't grasp that Julio was far more likely to advance the runner on first via another walk than he was to throw a pitch that could be easily bunted.  Mueller predictably - to me and my friend - popped a bunt attempt foul before striking out.

Lost in the tortured welter of lament about our terrible bullpen - and it is terrible - is that the manager is still awful. I mean, if you saw a guy in a pickup softball game slap a groundball to shortstop and then run directly to third base, you'd say, "Wow, this guy doesn't know how to play." Well, guess what, when a manager watches Ramiro Mendoza yield a line drive single, a line drive double, a line drive sac fly, a line drive out, a line drive single, a line drive single and a line drive single and opts to leave him in with the tying run on first, he doesn't know how to manage. And then when Mendoza gives up a booming double and is saved only by a great relay and a generous call all Gomer Grady can offer is some asinine bromide about winning the game or how bravely John Burkett battled.

Can you imagine a more combustible combination? This bullpen being handled by this jackass. Oy. We teach children not to play with matches but part of that deal, of course, is to provide them with other toys. The front office has left a child-like huckleberry with nothing to play with but matches, kindling and lighter fluid. It's almost cruel.

But wait, the Sox are 5-2. They've opened the season with consecutive road series wins for only the fifth time in franchise history. Why the panic across New England? 

Because Red Sox fans are smart. And they know this team cannot win the World Series. They know Chad Fox cannot close out a playoff series with a one-run lead. They know Pedro Martinez cannot pitch in a three-man playoff rotation and that Casey Fossum and John Burkett cannot win a playoff game. They know that a team with good infield defense doesn't yield seven infield hits in one game. They know that Derek Lowe's numbers will decline because that infield defense is so poor. They know this team will almost never successfully turn a 3-6-3 double play. They know this team will pound the soft underbelly of the American League but scuffle against the top tier teams. They know that this slow, potent offense is built for July and will post diminishing returns as the weather gets colder and the games get more important. Red Sox fans are not fooled by 12-2 drubbings of lousy teams. They think only of the big picture, of trying to win a road playoff game in Oakland on a chilly October night with the score tied 2-2 in the ninth and Pedro past his pitch count. 

And they know this team can't do it.

It's so obvious, heck, even Grady Little might know it.