Youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuk!

I think this line from yahoo says it all:

It’s all they needed against the Blue Jays, thanks to Jon Lester’s pitching and Dustin Pedroia’s fielding.

Pedroia's play on Wells in the 9th was sick. That ball was scorched up the middle.

I would also tip my cap to the heart of our order. Ortiz worked a good at bat to get on base in the bottom of the ninth with 2 outs. Manny with 2 strikes against him hits a nice little bloop into center field. Then Youk gets up and smacks a line drive to center, with the help of Wells bobbling the ball allowed Ortiz to score.

Lucky for me, I was at the game. It was the fastest game I've ever attended. It had a slight delay, due to rain and was over by 9:40! It was the first time in 17 years or so that my brother had been to Fenway. So it was cool to watch his reaction to the crowd. After all it is not everyday that you see 36,000 plus people sing a Neil Diamond song.

Note: It was great to Lowell back in the line up. He got a standing ovation for his first at bat.

WTF?

I have to say, this was a great weekend for me and Daisy to go without TV. For earth day we decided to give up non-essential electricity for a week. Anyway, it looks like we saved ourselves a ton of headache!

Swept by the Rays?! WTF!

Still Manny being Manny steals second for some unknown reason... first in 2 years!

Plus - Where is everyone? THis is pathetic. I can't do this by myself!

Two down 16 more to go

Fox's coverage yesterday was pretty miserable. In fact, at one point Daisy was moved to scream, "why don't you go into the dug-out and suck on his balls?!", in reaction to Buck's and McCarver's typical ass-kissing. I love that girl! Naturally, the 131-minute rain delay made things interesting. It was good to see Pap shut down Arod with 3 pitches and go onto to a smooth 9th. Manny is the man and I can't wait for Ortiz to get out of his slump.



So today is the rubber match: Dice-K vs. Phil Hughes. It's actually quite fitting. The Yankees have finally stopped their annual binge and purge of dead-arm veteran pitchers and over-the-hill sluggers. Phil Hughes is the face of the "Next Generation" Yankees, along with Ian Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain. On the other side, Dice-K is the Sox's 100 Million dollar man.

Advantage, Dice-K: With a BB/K ration of 9/22 and an ERA of 1.47. Hughes struggled against the new look Royals, but rebounded against the Blue Jays (5/6 BB/K and 5.00 ERA). Of course, this could come down to bullpens. As we all know, Dice-K can take an inning or two to find the strike zone. If the Sox can build an early lead, that might help motivate Dice-K to challenge hitters out of the gate.

Home opener

This is awesome. Three years too late (I still get pissed off when I think about that "We forgive you" banner), but a great gesture. I'm surprised (and happy) he agreed to do this.

Game at 2:05pm. Anyone around for a game thread?

update: today's Boston Herald: "All is Forgiven". God I hate the media.

Some good news...

...as the Sox sit in the AL East basement. (On pace to win 69 games! Oh no!)

The New York Times is (probably) about to fire Murray Chass.

Trivia

Okay, so the Sox are back to being a .500 team. That puts them in 4th, behind the Bay Rays, Orioles, and Blue Jays. Question: what was the latest in the season the Rays were first in the division? What was the latest they had a winning record?

0-4

The Tigers just lost their fourth in a row (3 to KC, this one to CHW). Small sample sizes are fun, but: rough start, or are they just not as good as people expected? Anyway, I was a little shocked to read this:

Not exactly the start hoped for by Detroit, which at $138.7 million opened the season with the second-highest payroll in the major leagues behind the New York Yankees.

This hasn't gotten that much press I think - everyone thinks of the Red Sox as having the 2nd highest payroll. In fact, they're not even third - the Mets have a higher payroll as well. Full list here. Top 2008 salaries are here - Yanks have the top three (ARod, Giambi, Jeter) and five of the top 12 (Abreu and Pettitte). Red Sox only have one player in the top 25 of salary - Manny Ramirez, in at #4.

Also, this is great.

Also, where is everyone? (Busy sulking about your crappy fantasy teams?)

Special Agents Embree and DiNardo...

...still on the payroll evidently. Nice to see the Sox pick up where they left off last year - getting the starting pitcher out of the game early.

"Guyner?"

The Sox recently signed 26-year-old right-hander Terumasa Matsuo, who will report to Fort Myers later in the week. Matsuo pitched for the "Kagawa Olive Guyners", whose logo and mascot are shown here. Apparently all the teams in Japan's Independent Shikoku Island League (of which Matsuo was the MVP last year) have similarly ridiculous team names and mascots. While I like the Olive Guyners (it looks like a Pixar movie!), the "Tokushima Indigo Socks" may be my favorite.