In a way this will be provide a way to get inside of the head of a couple of passionate sports fans and to chronicle a season. Obviously I have done this once before with Bleeding Red, but this will require a little less effort and will incorporate a little more teamwork. It has been two years now since I kept the diary just about every day, and I think I have the energy for something like this again, especially with the help of the Thunderstick. If you want to know the origins of the nickname, let's just say that you need to buy and read my book where it all becomes clear. The Thunderstick helped carry the Sox to the 2004 World Series title. I will go to my grave believing that.
So without further ado:
Thunderstick: Three innings in and I'm concerned this number won't be going down today. [DCAT Note: Every season before Opening day we put the number 163 into our email subject heading. Then each day during the season we update the "Magic Number" needed to clinch the AL East. So far it's been quite the cunning plan, as the Sox have never actually won an AL East title in the time that we have been doing this.] Observations from 3 innings of the season.:
1. I don't think we can expect a big year from Schill. Maybe that's reactionary, but he's just old and we shouldn't count on him being a 1 or even 2 anymore. As much as we love Schill from 2004, we need Beckett and DiceK to anchor this staff, not Schill.
2. The bottom of this lineup is going to drive me nuts.
3. I love having Drew. We'll see how he does, but I loved after Ortiz was on 2nd with 1 out that they pitched to Manny and then Drew came up with an open base and they pitched around him. In past years, they'd pitch around Manny to get to Nixon/Tek/Millar/Pena.
4. I have a feeling Lowell and Tek are going to suck this year.
dcat: Well, folks, welcome back to the mind of the Red Sox fan. It's one game (albeit one ugly, ugly game) in to the season and already the glass is half full and we are not quite sure what is in it. And yet we drink deeply from that glass.
And obviously it is just one game. But let me respond to Thunderstick's four points:
1. I could not agree more. We need Schill to be good, but if we have to rely on him to be the ace, we are in trouble. Fortunately, we should not have to rely on him to be the ace. But the one thing we need to keep an eye on is how he starts the season. I assume that Schill in a contract year is a good thing. And Schilling certainly has built up reservoirs of good will that should last forever. but Schill tends to have a bit of a mouth, and that plus his blog means that a lot of the Boston media will be looking for him to fall. I guarantee Shaughnessy will have the knives out tomorrow in the Globe. Still, this game tells us almost nothing. Schilling, I assume, will be fine.
2. There are days when the Sox are capable of making the opposing pitcher look like Bob Gibson and Sandy Koufax rolled into one. It's always been this way. The bottom third was a huge void last year as well, and when both Manny and Big Papi went down at different times in the last two months of the season we saw just how execrable that lineup could be -- and of course there has not been a team in the history of baseball that could absorb that sort of loss.
3. I most like the way that the Drew addition has a ripple effect on the entire lineup, but this is not that 2003-2005 team, that's for sure. My hope is that Francona will be able to find at bats for Wily Mo and we will be able to see if he can reach his potential. If he emerges as a viable run producer we will be much better off. I'm going to remain optimistic -- I have a hard time believing that we won't ream the Royals in one of the next two games.
4. I do not want to give up on Tek yet and even if he does not produce at the plate, as a catcher he does a lot more for the team. That said, if he has an OPS of .700 it really will not help us out even a little bit. Let's hope that George Kotteras is ahead of schedule with his development. I'll be happy is Lowell can match his first half from last year even if he fades toward the end. I'm a bit worried about whether Pedroia really is up for this challenge.
Additional points: All will be fine if we pound them in one of the next two games and especially if Dice-K makes the sort of debut we all dream of for him. I also want to make sure that we take advantage of this early season schedule. This is one of those years where April favors us and down the stretch things will be a bit tougher. If we want to win a championship we make our path a lot smoother by beating up on Kansas City and Texas and Seattle when we can and by punching the Yankees and Jays and O's in the mouth later in the month.
For years you and I have preached a consistent mantra: If you take 2 of 3 in every three game series and pull out a couple of 3 of 4 when the longer series come up, you'll win 100 games. If you win 100 games, you are a World series contender. Let's regroup on the day off and be ready to go on Wednesday.
6 comments:
Goodliberal--I echo all of your concerns.
i) This is just me and I know others don't do it, but when I see someone hit .300 in the minors, all it does is tell me that he's got a chance in the big leagues. I have no statistical evidence to back this up, but it seems like about 1 out of every 3-4 people that the Sox bring up that have had good minor league careers like Pedroia end up translating it to the big stage. That said, like you, I'll remain optimistic--no reason to not give him as good a chance as anyone else coming up.
ii and iii) No doubt on Tek and Coco--serious concerns there. Like you, the bottom of this lineup is a big concern. I wrote in that first email to Derek that I loved having Drew in the lineup behind Manny because he's by far the most dangerous hitter we've seen behind the 3/4 Ortiz/Manny combo since 2003. But after that I have my concerns--the 6-9 of Lowell, Tek, Coco and Dusty is going to negate a lot of the good of putting Drew behind the Ortiz/Manny combo. Hopefully we see Lowell play close to what he gave last year, Tek's bat speed pick back up, Coco have something closer to the year we thought he'd have when we got him and Dusty be a solid call-up. But there is disaster looming here to be certain. While I was always a bit frustrated with having Nixon/Millar/YoungerTek as protection for Manny/Ortiz, I always loved having a 6-9 made up three of Nixon/Millar/YoungerTek/Mueller before a Pokey Reese or someone at the 9. I'm very concerned that opposing pitchers are going to get 2-3 easy innings a game because of the 6-9 the Sox are now trotting out.
I'll weigth in on GoodLib's GoodPoints as well --
"i) Pedroia hit .300 in the minors. I expect it will take a while for him to find his feet. I have optimism."
Let's keep in mind that batting average is not the best matric to measure guys, but I agree -- let's not despair too early. But I guess what it comes down to for me is that I will be happy if he is serviceable this year, which would be great for a rookie if it were not for the concerns we have over the botton third of the lineup.
"ii) I worry about V-tek- his bat speed is so slow. And this time there is not the WBC excuse like last year. Are those knees finally giving way?"
This will be the ongoing plotline if he starts off slowly. And the question then becomes how bad would he have to get at the plate to counteract what he does behind the plate. I do not know the answer to that question, but I do not want to see Sox fans swallow the "intangibles" Kool Aid. Yes, Tek's leadership matters, especially with regard to calling a game. But let's not start acting like a bunch of Derek "Captain intangibles" Jeter fans.
"iii) This is a make/break year for Coco."
I'm actually not too worried about Coco. But here is what i am worried about -- we think of lineup contruction as a whole, to be sure, but within any given inning or two, there also is the factor of how a lineup is segmented. So, for example, we ask who will protect the cleanup guy. the Sox have Ortiz and Manny and Drew -- pick your poison. Bonds right now has Ray Durham. That's a huge difference. but beyond that, let's assume Coco does revover -- what prevents pitchers from working around him? Not in the way they work around a great player, but in the way that you can work around a guy by giving him slightly less to hit, making him chase balls on the edges and such. You simply cannot have a void where the one good guy at the back end is avoidable because there are three guys to go after rather than him.
As a bonus point: I still am in the Youkilis should lead off camp. On base percantage matters more than speed and especially base stealing. It just does. But this is especially true with a team like the Sox, who tend to go more station-to-station than hit and run and steal, or "small ball," as they say.
God, I'm glad baseball is back and I hated yesterday's Sox off day.
dcat
While I see your point about Youk, I'm totally on board. I think it's important to have a base stealing threat (even if they only steal 15-20 bases a year) at your lead-off spot. It's too bad someone can't do a measurement of how many hits guys get in the 2/3/4 spots because the pitcher is worrying too much about the guy on first taking off for second. I think Lugo and Crisp deserve their shots to leadoff.
I love Youk as our 2 spot. Youk seems like the perfect #2 to me--a guy that gets on base a lot, but that can also hit for a bit power. With a guy on first he's a threat to get a walk and get two men on with no outs for the Ortiz/Manny/Drew portion, and he's a threat also to put one down the line that could score a speedy runner like Lugo. And if that all fails, you know he's going to take a lot of pitches--you gotta figure the last thing a pitcher wants to do after a 7-10 pitch battle with a guy is see Ortiz coming up whether the pitcher wins or loses that battle.
That said, if Lugo or Crisp have OBPs of .210 come June 1st, I'd be more than happy to see Youk move up then because you still need a good leadoff guy.
sorry--mean to lead off that last post with "I'm not totally on board". The rest would make a lot more sense after that.
Let's just put it this way -- I know Crisp was bad last season, but I consistently hated him as leadoff with Youk at second. Youk saw the most pitches per plate appearance of any player in the AL last year and I think that patience can help him get on base. I simply am not convinced that stolen bases are as useful a commodity as conventional wisdom holds. I would argue that if stolen bases are a factor the real stat should be caught stealing or, better yet, percentage caught stealing.
As you say, much of this depends on Lugo's performance. But my ideal lineup would have Youks at the top of the order and go from there. We'll see how tito tinkers with lineups as the next few weeks progress.
dcat
Provided that Lugo or Crisp has a good OBP, I love them at the top of the lineup followed by Youk, Ortiz, Manny and Drew. It's 6-9 that right now have me so scared that I were dcat, I'd poop my pants (because he does that on a fairly regular basis)
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