Category: MLB

Chris Sale Named Opening Day Starter for the Red Sox. Thank God.

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As he should be. The guy was the Red Sox best pitcher last year, is likely to be their best pitcher this year, is a great spokesman for the team, not to mention he is legitimately mentoring the team’s top prospect in Jason Groome. The Opening Day start is his, he’s earned it.

Some say it should go to David Price because its his team and he has the seniority. Except Price has been a malcontent for the better part of two seasons in Boston, got in an embarrassing pissing contest with team broadcaster Dennis Eckersley, and has not pitched well consistently. I want to like David Price and believe me I realize that we need him to be good if the Sox are going to make a World Series run. But to give him the Opening Day start is the definition of coddling. Just because he makes the most money on the team does not give him the start by default. To paraphrase my friend Alec Baldwin, to give you the Opening Day start is to throw it away. The Opening Day start is for closers.

In all seriousness though, this gives Sale the unofficial title of staff ace, but it also lines up Price to get the home opener start at Fenway, which could be a fresh start for him and the fans. Lets get off to a good start and stop bashing the media and beloved team broadcasters and then we can talk. In the meantime though, we will continue to sell our YUCK merch.

 

The Bullpen Car is Returning to Major League Baseball!

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ESPN – The bullpen car is coming back after being gone for an entire generation of baseball fans. The Arizona Diamondbacks will use a helmet-clad golf cart for the first time since the vehicle left Major League Baseball more than two decades ago. “I think it wore out its welcome,” Diamondbacks president and CEO Derrick Hall said. “There were these new stadiums, and the focus shifted to the guys running through gates and onto the mound. We think the time is right to bring it back.” Hall said the Diamondbacks purchased two golf carts and had them retrofitted with big caps by SportsKartz, a company in Tampa, Florida. It’s not all for tradition. The Diamondbacks sold a sponsorship to OnTrac, a West Coast courier service, which will receive branding on the vehicles. “An ancillary benefit might be that it could speed up the game,” Hall said. “I expect a lot of teams to follow suit.”

Make Baseball Fun Again. One of the greatest idiosyncrasies of baseball was that the relief pitchers would get ferried from the bullpen to the goddamn mound like they were Xerxes invading Sparta.

I don’t want my Closer expending any energy at all commuting to work. Let the guy save his bullets for when the action really matters on the mound. It would seem the bullpen car was invented more out of necessity than entertainment.

“Nobody ran in from the bullpen,” said Dick Stigman, who pitched for the Cleveland Indians, Minnesota Twins and Boston Red Sox in the 1960s. “I don’t think we could’ve made it. We all smoked.”

Now its back and I could not be more excited. Of course we have to be careful of rogue mascots driving like total assholes:

Or the Marshawn Lynch’s of the world just running people down:

But aside from that I think we’re in for a renaissance. Will this speed up the game of baseball? Almost certainly not! What it will do though is encourage less and less conditioning among relief pitchers. Hopefully to the point that guys like El Guapo and Bartolo are a more common sight than a workout warrior like AJ Ramos.

Just like the good old days, when men smoked cigarettes in the dugout and drank whiskey in between at-bats. Health and well being be damned, Make Baseball Fun Again.

 

JD Martinez Introduced by Red Sox; Crisis Averted. So, Does Another 9 Figure Contract in the Clubhouse Help or Hurt?

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JD Martinez has officially been introduced by the Red Sox so everyone can safely remove their finger from the panic button.

I fully admit I was starting to get a little nervous about the Red Sox shiny new toy, despite all the Boston sports writers rushing to their keyboards to defend the honor of the Sox and say this was totally normal.

Its definitely not out of the ordinary for any team to work in a clause in a contract to protect both sides. Think of when the Sox signed John Lackey and specifically put a clause in the deal saying if he missed any significant amount of time due to Tommy John Surgery, the Red Sox would automatically get an additional year added onto Lackey’s contract at the league minimum salary.

Now that ended poorly of course as Lackey blew his elbow out, activated the clause, and then bitched and moaned about said clause, and forced his way out of town via trade. So I honestly don’t know if those types of deals are still kosher in the MLB, but working language in that can activate opt outs is nothing new. However, announcing a deal is done and then not introducing the player for 7 full days is far from normal.

Whatever, either way the deal is done. It might not ever come out what the actual language was that caused the delay, but I think its safe to say, barring a very specific injury, JD Martinez is here for the long run.

Martinez does have an opt out clause of his own after the 2nd and 3rd year of the contract, but this is a guy thats already 30 years old and couldn’t find the deal he wanted after a 45 Home Run season. So you’re telling me that guy is going to opt out when he’s 32 or 33 in hopes of that mythical $200 Million deal? Sorry my friend, the days of guys on the wrong side of 30 getting that type of money are over. You can thank A-Rod, Pujols, and Miguel Cabrera for sucking that well dry.

Martinez is a good fit here though and more importantly he’s a veteran guy who’s completely reworked his game to get to where he is now. Seriously. He got cut by the Astros in 2013 and I mean the shit-bum Astros that lost 111 games that year, not the sexy 2017 World Series winning Astros. Then he signs with Detroit, reworks his entire swing and breaks out in 2015 with 38 Home Runs making his first All-Star team. Then in the midst of his career year, the Tigers ship him off to Arizona where he puts on a hitting clinic and finishes the year with 45 dingers.

So while he may not have that playoff/big market experience, he definitely has the adversity thing down pat. (Does that concern me in terms of consistency? 100%) My point is, a rough stretch should be no big deal to this guy. That could be very valuable in a club house that was filled with more dickhead diva types than blue collar types that willed their way to success. There were too many instances of guys like Mookie or Xander hitting a cold streak and instead of working it out, they went into the tank and had massive slumps en route to hugely disappointing years.

Hopefully another 9 figure contract walking into the clubhouse has the balls and really just the gravitas to tell some of these guys whats up rather than letting David Price run the joint all by himself. Think about it, theres not a lot of guys on that team that are 1.) good enough and 2.) paid enough to demand that immediate respect. Thats why this role has seemingly defaulted to David Price once David Ortiz was no longer around. Sure you could say Chris Sale, but I honestly think he’d rather be a lead by example type of guy. Pedroia threw his teammates under the bus last year with the whole Adam Jones scenario. Hanley Ramirez isn’t engaged enough to be a leader. Bogaerts seems to want no part of it and the rest of the team is full of young guys or part-timers. Your best bet is either Mookie taking on the role like he’s said he wants to or JD Martinez coming in and being THE guy. Only time will tell, but I am fired up to see this team on the field together.

Tim Tebow: I Still Have Offers To Play In The NFL. All 32 NFL Teams: No You Don’t

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Yahoo – …..“Well, no. It wasn’t like that,” Tebow said. “I mean, I still have offers to go play other positions in … ”

Well what can I say, what the 300’s giveth, the 300’s taketh away. Because before I saw this and nearly spit out the water I was drinking (humblebrag, I hydrate quite a lot) I was pretty pro-Tebow. I think I wrote a bit of a hit-piece on something he did or said on here but overall I was. Let him do his thing. Sure the overly polite, always nice thing is a little much and pretty contrived, but he’s been a winner in all he has done, is set for life, and if he is given a chance to pursue another childhood dream of his, why not? Go for it kid. Then this pops up today and I kind of have to reverse course on Tebow. Because if there is one thing I simply can’t stand in this world it’s when someone completely lacks self-awareness. No sense of who they are or how they are viewed by the public. That is why some people have slowly turned on Tebow over the years. That’s why people have turned on folks like Brendan Schaub and my aforementioned least favorite person Justin Bieber – they simply have lost any concept of how people view them or what value they provide in people’s lives. In the case of Timothy Tebow, he provides value to approximately nobody’s life in terms of playing the game of football.

Now, I’m not calling Tebow a liar here, I’m not. I’m sure he has offers to “come to camp” or “have a tryout” or some other “we’ll take a long shot on you” chance. What he doesn’t have is offer to play. In the. NFL. There’s a difference. I’m sure the majority of teams in need of a TE or a FB or a personal fucking punt protector see it as a no-lose scenario to have Tebow come in and try out for that gap in their roster. It’ll spark public interest in the team, it’ll show their fan base they are “listening” and also trying to improve the roster, and hell, if he makes the team, the dollars will start rolling in faster than a crew of 20 year olds to a DayGlo party. With all of that said, this is an offer to TRY OUT. Come prove that you can do a damn thing to help us win a football game. Not an offer to show up, suit up, and go out there and play, because 0 out of 32 teams have any real confidence Tim Tebow can do that on a professional level.

So the question is: is he simply bragging in an interview, reminding NFL teams he’s still open to coming back (as a quarterback LAUGHING CRYING FACE EMOJI), or does he seriously think there are teams out there that are really hoping they can get his name on a 53 man roster? I honestly think it’s the latter, he just has that much self confidence, and like I said, as evidenced by a million interviews, a complete lack of self awareness. He probably has a lot to offer football in terms of coaching, mentoring, and analysis, but his playing days should just be considered over. Done with. Fin. For everyone’s sake.

David Price Doing His Best to Deter Free Agents from Signing With the Red Sox

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ESPN –  J.D. Martinez had no shortage of information to consider before agreeing Monday evening to sign with the Boston Red Sox. But ace David Price tried to make the slugger’s decision a little bit easier. “I’ve talked to him a couple of times,” Price said recently. “I told him we’d love to have him here.” Price, Martinez’s teammate with the Detroit Tigers in 2014-15, elaborated in an interview with USA Today Sports that was published Tuesday. “I told J.D. he will love the guys here in this clubhouse, but also told him he’ll get booed,” Price told the newspaper. “He’s a quiet, soft-spoken guy, but he’ll handle it. Besides, everyone gets booed. I heard Big Papi get booed many times in Fenway.”

Jesus christ this guy just can’t get out of his own way. Just lie to us. Just lie. Don’t tell me that you told a Free Agent Boston is a great place to play, but then follow that up IMMEDIATELY by saying its a negative shit hole and all the fans will boo you and are mean on Twitter.

“It’s tough here,” is how Price described his first two seasons in a Red Sox uniform, according to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. “There’s just so much more negativity.”

And whats all this about booing David Ortiz? Many times? I mean maybe some fans did in 2009 (the only year from 2004-2013 he didn’t make the All-Star team) when he hit .238? That was also a cool 7 years before Price played for the Red Sox. Did fans boo Big Papi many times in the one season they played together in 2016? Ya know the year Ortiz hit .315 with 48 Home Runs and 127 RBI’s on his retirement tour? The year he had a 1.021 OPS, the 4th best of his entire 20 year career?

I call Kangaroo Court.

But, I digress. If anything, this tells you what JD Martinez thinks of David Price’s opinion. Oh its a miserable, negative shit hole? I’m in.

Meanwhile we have Rick Porcello going the complete opposite direction in his assessment of Boston when asked by Martinez:

“It’s honestly a pleasure playing in Boston,” he explained. “Yeah, there are tough times if you’re not playing well. You’re going to hear about it. But what’s wrong with that? Who doesn’t want to hear about it? Because when you are playing well, it feels like you’ve got the entire world behind you, and that’s all you can ask for as a player. That’s fair.”

Little tidbits like this make me wonder just how divided this Red Sox clubhouse really is. You have guys like Porcello and Chris Sale talking about how they love the pressure and accountability of Boston, which is the antithesis of Price who bitches about everything every chance he gets. I wonder if one of the veterans is going to, if they haven’t already, tell Price to just STFU.

Before the negative attitude infects all of the good young players on this team and they think its natural, encouraged even, to piss and moan to the media every time Dan Shaugnessy writes a mean word about you.

This is what guys like Price say they understand, but they don’t really get it. If you 1.) play hard and 2.) perform well you’ll be scotch. Hell even if you can’t do #2 but you still do #1 then you’re good in my book. Trot Nixon is a goddamn legend in this town. People to this day still lovingly refer to him as a dirt dog. The guy with a .274 career batting average and 137 Home Runs. That guy is revered around here because he played his balls off every day.

I’m not saying you can’t complain or you can’t get mad because that’s only human, but channel that negative energy man. Use it. Get pissed off. Pitch well for an entire season. But don’t cash those $31 Million checks every year while whining about every little perceived slight every single time there’s a mic in your face. And definitely do not tell prospective Free Agent signings that they will get booed by the fans if they sign here. Christ.

All 30 MLB Teams Will be Wearing Marjory Stoneman Douglas Hats This Weekend to Honor School Shooting Victims

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I read the other day that this was initially going to just be a Miami Marlins thing since Stoneman Douglas is right in their backyard. I also read that because of the MLB’s tone deaf rules the players would only be allowed to wear the hats in pre-game, but it looks like they’ve reversed course in a big way.

Now ALL 30 MLB teams will be wearing the high school’s hat with the option to wear it in-game. Thats awesome. Its small condolences to the kids who had to go through hell this week, but its a great way to show support and solidarity with the community.

If you remember both New York teams donned first responder caps in the wake of 9/11 as a way to show support. Its a small gesture, but sometimes those can go pretty far.

John Henry Just Son’d Tom Werner Saying “We Don’t Need to Be Popular, We Need to Win.”

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ABC – As the Boston Red Sox stepped out into the sun Monday for their first full-squad workout of spring training, owner John Henry maintained that he’s more concerned about W’s and L’s than the team’s Q rating. “We really don’t need to be popular,” Henry said. “We need to win.” But despite winning 93 games and the American League East title for a second straight season in 2017, questions were raised about the Red Sox’s likability. Although attendance at Fenway Park remained almost unchanged, regional television ratings were down 15 percent on New England Sports Network, according to Nielsen Media data, while sports-talk airwaves were filled with the grievances of dissatisfied fans.

If you’ve ever read “Feeding the Monster” then you know exactly what I’m talking about here. In the behind the scenes book covering the inner workings of the Red Sox you read about a young Theo Epstein going to battle time and time again with Tom Werner and the entertainment side of the Sox over player personnel.

Theo wanted to build a farm system and sign smart, albeit boring, free agents to, ya know, win. Tom Werner isn’t against winning per se, but goddamnit the Red Sox needed to be sexy. He wanted more big names, more story lines.Winning be damned. The team had to be marketable to more demos with more attractive stars. Seriously. Read the book, Werner said that shit. You think hits like Roseanne just fall into place? No way. It takes years of creative genius steering the ship and shame on Theo for not listening to the Neilsen Rating System more when building his roster. Guy never stood a chance as a baseball executive going up against brainpower like Tom Werner.

Goddamnit. Can you tell I’m still bitter about the Red Sox running the best baseball mind of our generation out of town?

Anyways, if we’re going to take John Henry at his word, it seems like he may be smartening up. He’s not exactly George Steinbrenner so he’s not going to just punt on everything that doesn’t directly lead to winning. But, Henry is a smart dude, he knows that popularity follows winning, not the other way around. If the Red Sox are hammering opposing teams all summer on their way to a World Series then they’ll be pretty damn popular. However, if the team is focused on signing guys based solely on their marketability (i.e Pablo Sandoval the Panda) well thats how you find yourselves in a shit storm you’re still digging out of 3 years later.

I Think the Red Sox Yankees Rivalry May Finally Be Back

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Its been a tough decade for the so called blood feud between the Red Sox and the Yankees. Neither team has really been very good at the same time recently. After the epic postseason clashes of 2003 and 2004 the two sides haven’t played each other in the playoffs even once. Before last year, both teams hadn’t even made the playoffs in the same season since 2009. In 2007 when the Sox won it all, the Yankees got smoked in the divisional round. In 2009 when the Yankees won it all, the Sox got swept in the divisional round. And in 2013 when the Red Sox went the distance again, the Yanks straight up sucked and missed the playoffs winning only 85 games.

The guys much smarter than me over at fivethirtyeight.com actually put together a graph last year, based on each team’s World Series odds, to measure how meaningful games between the Sox and Yankees actually have been over the years.

“From 2007 to 2016, the typical Yanks-Sox contest was only about as important as any old opening-day game. In other words, it was fun but no big deal.”

So we’re on the up ladies and gentlemen. Last year Boston won its second straight AL East crown and the Yankees came within a game of advancing to the World Series on the back of young, homegrown talent. All of that was BEFORE New York added the best power hitter in the game in Giancarlo Stanton. The Yankees, who featured a guy in Aaron Judge who hit 52 home runs AS A ROOKIE, just added a guy who hit 59 home runs. Ridiculous.

Well, thank god the Sox finally responded by signing one Julio Daniel Martinez.

It took a lot longer than most expected, but it sure is nice to take a team that won 93 games and then add this guy: .303 BA/.376 OBP/ .690 SLG with 45 Home Runs and 104 RBIs.

And for all the Yankees fans in my timeline talking shit already (its not even St. Patty’s Day yet) I’m just going to quote my man Jared Carrabis:

“After finishing last in the league in homers last year, the Red Sox added the player who is second in the MLB in slugging percentage (.574) since the start of the 2014 season behind Mike Trout (.579) with a minimum of 300 games played.”

A consolation prize he is not.

My point being though is this could be the first time we see Boston and New York square off in the playoffs in more than a decade. Both teams are stacked, young, and trending upwards. Sure the Patriots have taken the No. 1 spot in town and the Sox have won 3 titles since 2004, but I honestly don’t think thats why the venom between the Red Sox and the Yankees has dissipated. No, its because both teams haven’t been trying to kill each other for that next ring. If the Yankees and their loudmouth fans in the Bronx are standing between Chris Sale and a World Series appearance, you better fucking believe fans are gonna be fired up.

All we need is the opportunity, and thats what we have here tonight.