Big Win Makes For Bigger Day

Not only did the Red Sox win an enormous game on Tuesday, they accomplished all of the following:

1) Won in a Tim Wakefield start, and his first back off the DL at that.
2) Proved that they can rack up hits and score runs with Manny Ramirez in the Bronx.
3) Added a game in the wild card standings between themselves and the Yankees, meaning that -- at worst -- they'd have a four-game edge two days from now.
4) Added depth and another bat to the outfield, assuming that the Mark Kotsay trade goes through.

Which of those moves is most significant remains to be seen. Another win in Yankee Stadium, and that victory would immediately take precedence over all other actions. The Yankees truly are on the brink now, there's no denying it. Losing this series to the Sox, as Manager Joe Girardi said before the three-game set started, would essentially end realistic playoff hopes for New York. Doesn't mean it wouldn't happen, but it would be severely unlikely.

Add in a near perfect bullpen session from Boston ace Josh Beckett, and you have the makings of one incredibly strong night for the Red Sox. Sure, Manny Delcarmen had another rough night -- an increasingly worrisome trend -- but he was bailed out by the burgeoning bullpen star Justin Masterson.

One huge day, one day closer to dual goals: A playoff berth and the simultaneous denial of the Yankees earning one.

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Cue Daniel Powter

Has there ever been a more appropriate time for "Had a Bad Day"? Maybe not for Jon Lester and Red Sox fans.

Not only did Lester get knocked around on Saturday, he did so by one Wild Card chaser, allowing the other to close ground. After a convincing win behind newcomer Paul Byrd on Saturday, the Sox seemed to be in good shape for a timely three-game sweep in Canada, a set that would A) prove that Boston had turned the tables on a remarkably disappointing string of Toronto frustration, and B) distance itself from both the Blue Jays and Yankees, who were swept by their Canadian division mates last week.

Now, neither of those outcomes is in the offing, and the pitching shortcoming that led to that finality was one of the least likely this year: Jon Lester didn't come through.



That's right, in a year in which Lester has morphed from a fringe fifth-starter to a borderline ace, the lefty was knocked around from the early moments of the first inning Saturday, providing the pitching ammunition for Rogers Center fireworks that would make the organizers in Beijing blush. His fastball was a bit off, his location missed by inches and, as a result, the Pacific kid went from being unhittable -- literally, as he proved earlier this year -- to eminently drillable.

The result, of course, was the 11-0 whitewash that followed, a game which puts significantly more pressure on Daisuke Matsuzaka entering Sunday afternoon's series finale. If the Dice man can come through again, the Sox will close out an impressive two-of-three set in Canada, where no one has been winning series lately. If he doesn't, Boston will find itself wondering whether it has the ammunition to mount a run on Tampa while simultaneously holding off both the Yankees and Blue Jays. Between the series finale tomorrow and next week's set at Yankee Stadium, the next week will go a long way toward plotting the team's trajectory down the stretch. It's no coincidence that, just as Josh Beckett announces he'll miss a start, Tim Wakefield comes back. And Bartolo Colon throws a dominant outing in AAA.

The way things are going, they'll all need to get back. Fast.

More Than a Simple Setback

Wednesday night's loss in Baltimore, in the capper of a three-game set at Camden Yards which the Red Sox badly needed to sweep to keep pace with the resurgent Rays, was a brutal setback.

It was a setback to Boston, which needed the win to finally gain a game on the Rays, who somehow keep piling up wins while two of their key offensive cogs while away on the disabled list.


It was a setback to the bullpen, which had responded to criticism with the help of Justin Masterson's addition to shore up many of it's prior weaknesses. Whenever an infielder starts warming up in the bullpen late in a game, it's not a good sign for a pitching staff, and Alex Cora wasn't beyond the outfield walls for a lark.

But perhaps most importantly, it was a catastrophic setback to Clay Buchholz, a rising star at the season's outset who know finds himself on a shuttle back to Portland, demoted to AA to regain composure and mental acuity, little of which he's shown this year.

A year ago, Buchholz was on the precipice of call-up immortality, a fill-in starter who would toss a no-hitter in his second major league start, combining guile and beguiling stuff to completely riddle the very same Orioles club which last night clubbed him into submission in less than three innings. A couple short weeks after his no-hitter, Buchholz was converted to a reliever for the remainder of 2007, setting the stage for the young hurler to play a key role in the team's postseason run.

Yet just days after he started his second role of the year, Buchholz complained of shoulder pain in a bullpen session, was diagnosed with shoulder fatigue and was done for the year. At the time, WMYM's prior online literary embodiment said his loss could be a crushing blow to the team's playoff hopes. Obviously, that wasn't the case. Still, such was his status that his absence from a role he had only begun days before would strike such fear in Red Sox Nation.

Not anymore. This year, Buchholz has been disappointing at best and a complete, unabetted disaster at worst. Last night's setback was his seventh straight loss, dating back to May, the first time since 2002 that a Boston pitcher dropped seven straight starts. What's worse, there have been scant moments where Buchholz has even provided reason for optimism amongst those losses. Bad pitch decision because of a reluctance to overuse his curveball -- his most dynamic pitch -- and a lack of execution turned the promising rookie from a can't-miss fourth starter to a black hole.

Clearly, this move was needed. It's been needed for a long time, perhaps even dating back to the first time Buchholz was temporarily shut down for rest. It was needed for the team's prospect for the postseason and for Buchholz's prospects for the future.

It's always easy to criticize the organization's reluctance to pull the plug on Buchholz, but in truth it would have been hard for anyone to so long as he kept racking up strikeouts. The final straw came last night when he couldn't avoid walks to load the bases, then couldn't avoid pitching over the middle of the plate. The Red Sox will survive without Buchholz -- Tim Wakefield could return as early as next week, and Josh Beckett is progressing optimistically two days after it was announced he'd miss a start with numbness in his pitching hand -- but the real question isn't about the immediate future of the 2008 season. It's about the future of the organization.

That's because as much as the Red Sox will survive without Buchholz, only Buchholz knows if he can survive and re-create his dominance outside of Boston. Both sides have to hope that journey starts in Portland, and that is starts right away.

Turning a Corner or Watching a Collapse

The weekend was a walking disaster.

Three games against Toronto, for most of the season, was a ticket to a winning streak. Now, because of ignominous timing and a bad matchup in Paul Byrd's debut, because of bad weather and then a truly horrendous outing from Josh Beckett, the Red Sox hit the road riding a painful two game losing streak in need of redemption in Baltimore, just as the Orioles return from a demolition of the Tigers and surprising series win.


It's all part of a rapidly changing AL East which could wreak havoc on the American League playoff races. The interesting thing, of course, is that the three teams who finished on the bottom of the division last year are having the biggest swing effect a year later. Here's how, at least according to WMYM, it stacks up right now:

BALTIMORE: Is stunningly better than the Orioles team that started the season. The notable part of that, of course, is that the Orioles are essentially the same team, their young players are suddenly just significantly more confident. That's a testament to the entire organization, but mostly to 1) Adam Jones, who might be the most dynamic of the division's young center fielders (yes, that includes Jacoby Ellsbury), 2) Brian Roberts (is he ever going to stop producing?), 3) Jeremy Guthrie (has anyone even noticed that he's 8-2 since June 1st?) and, probably most significantly, GM Andy McPhail. We were sure that the walking disaster he created on the northside of Chicago was a product of the "real" McPhail. Evidently we were wrong. Sorry Senor Andy (yes, that is a Weeds joke).

BOSTON: Is this really a World Series team? It's hard to tell, but the fact that the Red Sox keep struggling to track down Tampa Bay, with the Rays mixing their fair share of L's in with the W's, mind you, doesn't necessarily bode well. Sure, the outfield is a hell of a lot more solid defensively with Manny Ramirez gone, and Jason Bay has done his best to reproduce the numbers ManRam was cranking out at the plate, and for the most part he's succeeded. Still, the team as a whole seems to be trucking along and winning by the skin of their teeth. And with outings like the one Joshie put up yesterday, there's a hell of a lot to be worried about.

NEW YORK: The Yankees are supposed to be the Yankees, and in truth there's still time for them to become the Yankees. But this team really doesn't like like they're ready to turn on the jets like New York teams in years past, does it? The more you watch, and the more injuries they're hit with, the more it looks like they're being completely held up by Derek Jeter and the ghost of Johnny Damon. Hell, maybe this really is the year that Jeter is finally just worn out and Damon is too injured to shake things up down the stretch. And now that we've just made that pronouncement, WMYM is going to go stab ourselves in the eyes repeatedly for putting out a reverse jinx on our own team.


TORONTO: Easily the scariest team on the schedule, because they can be a world beater one night (see: Sunday in Boston) and can look like a AAA composite the next. We've reached the point of the year where you're not beating Roy Halladay, and A.J. Burnett is going to put on the after-burners because he's ostensibly playing for a new contract. Scott Rolen finally looks comfortable, David Eckstein is still annoying and Cito Gaston is both back and fat. That's enough to make any matchup against them maddening, particularly since Gaston hasn't had time to lock into any discernable, long-term patterns yet. WMYM is already cringing thinking about Fri-Sun, not to mention that four-game Fenway series Sep. 12-14. And the three-game stretch on the 19-21.


Where does that put everyone? It means the Red Sox are still not sure if they're the team they're supposed to be, Baltimore currently doesn't know who it's supposed to be so it's playing better than it should, Toronto is finally realizing who it was supposed to be and is playing like it, Tampa Bay is remembering the team everyone thought it would be and is scared and New York is, well, New York is just tired? Maybe we're off base here, but when you cut through all the commotion, that's what it looks like, doesn't it?

Thoughts? And as a result, how important does that make this series at Camden Yards? Sure seems important to us.

Plenty of Drama, But Wins Are Wins

If you were trying to script the last couple of Red Sox wins, the results you got were far too soap opera-esque to be believed.

A blown 10-run lead in the first inning? No way. Two straight games with late-inning collapses? Even against a shaky middle relief corp, seems a bit far fetched.

Well, so much for screenwriters. The melodrama from the past two days has hit the roof, and that's before taking into account an abdomen strain and DL stint for Mike Lowell or the acquisition of Paul Byrd and, seemingly, subsequent demotion of Clay Buchholz.

Still, all that truly matters are the numbers on the Green Monster scoreboard at the end of the game. For the second straight night, those were pretty good this evening, despite a disappointing three run homer given up by Mike Timlin in just the latest proof that the veteran is careening down a precipitous downlslope of his career.

Meanwhile, Javier Lopez got the Sox out of trouble, then promptly put them back in it. Only Justin Masterson's performance was reassuring in relief, and that still came with plenty of drama. Sure, Masterson allowed a fluky hit and somewhat disturbing walk. The reassurance comes from how he responded, calmly fielding his position to facilitate a double play, then egging a pop-out from Michael Young to end the game.

Of course, those up and down efforts would have been worthless if not for another sparkling outing from Jon Lester, who looked like he was ticketed for a complete game until a homer and bad bounce got him in eighth inning trouble. Lester continues to be a rock in the rotation, giving the Sox something they thought would be provided by Josh Beckett and Daisuke Matsuzaka; two legitimate aces who dominate opponents and almost guarantee wins.

That's not to demean Dice-K's season, nor his bulging win total. He's immensely improved over his 2007 debut season, consistently wriggling out of the jams he often couldn't last year.  Those three starters are precisely the reason why Boston is so dangerous in the playoffs, but the bullpen's abhorent performance over the past two nights is precisely why it'll need to keep getting runs from David Ortiz, Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia and the shockingly hot Jed Lowrie if they're going to catch Tampa Bay and gather more momentum heading toward the playoffs.

Given the injuries Tampa's suffered in the past week -- devastating, multiple-week losses of outfielders Carl Crawford and rookie of the year candidate Evan Longoria -- and the fact that the Red Sox can block the Rays from adding personnel via the waiver wire, you have to like the position Boston is sitting in. Meanwhile, the Yankees haven't completely played themselves out of the postseason yet -- years past have certainly proven that -- but they're making yet another trip to the playoffs a pretty tall order entering the final six weeks of the season.

Oh, and in case you forgot, Jason Bay is looking awful good, and comfortable, in a Sox uniform. It just bears mentioning, particularly considering the fact that Manny Ramirez likely wouldn't have been playing half the time whatsoever.

A New Knuckler?

That's right folks, the Charlie Zink era has officially begun.


Maybe that's a bit strong, particularly considering the fact that this afternoon's acquisition of Paul Byrd all but ensures that this will be Zink's lone big league start this year. That still doesn't detract from the decision to go with Zink over a bevy of other options for a fill-in start while Tim Wakefield recovers from shoulder soreness and a cortisone shot, which was administered Sunday. Wake's shoulder problems go a long way toward disproving the idea that knuckleballers don't need traditional rest, but they did little to push the Boston brass away from giving Zink his first major league start.

In recent memory, plenty of knuckleballers have struggled in their first start, but that doesn't necessarily mean Zink will follow in that pattern. He's got plenty going for him. Kevin Cash, his catcher all last year in Pawtucket, is back behind him again tonight. He's cruised through this season racking up 13 wins with a sub-3.00 ERA (2.89, to be exact), and can openly attribute his success to a complete willingness to throw knuckleballs in any count.

Add to that the three days rest Zink will be pitching on -- he tossed in Pawtucket last Friday -- and Zink is likely to be significantly more relaxed than he would be otherwise in an initial big league start.

That's a good thing, because the Sox are heading into a pivotal stretch. The Yankees are reeling, losers of four straight, and despite yet another recent winning stretch, the Devil Rays have absorbed two crucial injuries in the past two days, losing both leadoff man Carl Crawford to a broken hand and rookie All-Star Evan Longoria to a broken bone in his wrist. Does that mean Tampa will fade? Hardly. But it does mean that they'll have to find a way to adapt, making their inability to add a big bat at the trade deadline even more galling.

The Rangers are in town first, so they'll get to see what Zink really has to work with. If Boston gives him some early runs to work with and his knuckler flutters the way it has at AAA this season, all bets are off.

One Good Sweep Deserves Another

There are road trips, and then there are road trips where a team needs to made hay.

Well, it's time to make some hay.


Boston opens it's latest sojourn away from the friendly confines of Fenway Park tonight in Kansas City, the first stop on a tour in which the Red Sox clearly need to keep winning to keep pace in an AL East race that is not about to go away. Amazingly, the Devil Rays are right on pace and the Yankees, buoyant after adding Xavier Nady and Pudge Rodriguez, are about to charge. If you need more proof of that, check their two-scoops of comeback win over the Angels yesterday.

Of course, those are precisely the reason the Jason Bay trade was so important. It's picked up the spirit of the Sox, all while keeping the media circus alive with tales of Manny Ramirez's petulant recent past, complete with him refusing to board the bus to Seattle and then turning back MRIs, not to mention his begging back to Boston after he was -- at least according to him -- miraculously dealt on the verge of the deadline last Thursday.

There's no two ways to put it: Bay's been terrific so far. Every time he touches the ground it looks like he's stretching a hit farther than he should. He swings with ease, he says all the right things after games and he clearly has his teammates rallying around that.

Will the rejuvenated push toward the playoffs -- and balanced lineup -- keep making strides? It'll have to with a shift in formation, and minus Mike Lowell, if they can in KC tonight. Will Bay keep hitting like a house afire away from home?

Time to find out.

Bay Leading the Way

The Jason Bay era is only two games old, but it's been a good two days, hasn't it?

Boston's new leftfielder has established an emotional link to the team and city via his father's fandom. He's scored a game-winning run, belted a monstrous three-run homer and saved runs with impressive defense. He's showing all the hustle than Manny Ramirez didn't across a mercurially brilliant eight-year stint in Boston, and by the sheer force of his low-key personality and unbending willingness to fit in, the entire team seems to be rally around Bay.

Not to mention the fact that his last name is tailor-made for brilliant headlines. We can rhyme and conceptcast this puppy until the cows come home.

Of all those things, the most important factor, clearly, is one that Bay identified himself in his introductory press conference. He is NOT Manny Ramirez, and he's not going to try to be. Instead, he's a guy with almost identical numbers who has all the clubhouse positives that ManRam didn't. And now, for the first time in his career, he gets a chance to fight for something that matters, in front of a crowd that quite clearly can't get enough of him.

It may not end as glowingly as it's started, but that story about Manny trying to beg his way out of the Dodgers trade looks like postscript right now, doesn't it? Revisionist history can be harsh, and it's entirely possible that this move could go down as a seismic Theo Epstein blunder. But it could also be one of his finest -- and boldest -- moments.

So far, it looks a lot more like the latter than the former, doesn't it?

Bay State Games

Someone needs to copyright that phrase pronto. Who knows if Jason Bay will hit as well as he could at Fenway, but if he does, a blind and deaf salesman could still peddle 800 of those shirts on Yawkey Way within a week.

All clever puns and hopefulness aside, it's hard to make a case for the Manny Ramirez-Bay trade based on the numbers. Of course, that's why its the other aspects of the move that made it absolutely essential to make. On WEEI this afternoon, Providence Journal Red Sox writer Sean McAdam made the case that owner John Henry had frequently defended ManRam because his productivity looked so good on paper. That meshed well with Henry's background as a millionaire stock broker, but Manny's human side -- read: "Jesus! This guy is absolutely killing our clubhouse!" -- finally hit home for Henry when he was the subject of personal attacks ManRam made repeatedly to media sources, mostly ESPN Deportes, across the last week.

Now, McAdam was quick to question some of the validity of those comments, saying that they could have been translated more harshly than intended from their original Spanish, but they were unquestionably a direct shot on Henry, Tom Werner, Larry Luchhino and the rest of the Red Sox front office when, before Wednesday's huge game against the Angels, Ramirez told ESPN Deportes that the Red Sox didn't deserve a player like himself.

That's true, but for all the reasons Ramirez didn't consider.

The Red Sox don't deserve a player like ManRam because he's a consistent headache and pain in the ass. They don't deserve a player like Ramirez because his lackadaisical outfield play costs the team at least 10-15 runs a year -- though it also unarguably saves them five or so because of his expertise dealing with the wall. They don't deserve a player like Ramirez because he can singlehandedly kill the momentum created by the rest of the team with one selfish "I'm questionable because my knee hurts" move.

No, the Red Sox deserve a young outfielder like Jason Bay, a power hitter who was the National League rookie of the year in 2004 and is still only 29. They deserve a player like Bay, a pull-hitting righty who has been driving shots toward a cavernous left field wall that's 441 feet from home plate, ridiculously farther than the 37-foot high Monster he'll be hitting them toward now. They deserve a player like Bay, who's already developed a reputation for earnest hustle and consistent defense, an All-Star who has as many homers as Ramirez, though they may be less majestic.

They deserve a player like Bay, productive without the panache, content to fit in with a contender after years slugging each night in anonymity in the baseball desert of Pittsburgh. And Bay deserves his shot to be a real contributor, a player who can make a name for himself in a season and a half before he hits the free market as a Boras client.

Don't get WMYM wrong, the side pieces in this deal hurt Boston. Bad. We're officially on the record from here on out believing that giving up on Craig Hansen may come back to haunt us, not to mention the remarkably timely contributions from Brandon Moss, a perfect September call-up if ever there was one.

But this was still the deal that HAD to happen if Boston was going to compete in '08. The Yankees may have won the trade war, particularly after getting Pudge Rodriguez. But with Bay -- and more significantly, minus Manny -- the Sox ensured that they still have a shot to catch a second wind, galvanize as a team in a way they couldn't with ManRam on board and start fighting in the division as a team on the chase rather than the reigning World Series champs.

If memory serves us correctly, that may not be a bad thing for their future. It beats being a sitting duck with a free agent to be left fielder who may or may not sit out the final third of a season because he's sick of Beantown.

Hasta Luego, Manny. Good Luck in Miami

It's actually going to happen, so brace for it Boston. You've seen Manny Ramirez play his last game in a Red Sox uniform.

If that's the case -- and the more these three-way rumors with the Pirates and Marlins heat up, the more it's starting to look like an eventuality -- ManRam's exit over the past two days has been unbelievably anonymous on the field. While he's been lazing his way to first matter-of-factly on routine ground outs, he's also been actively talking his way out of Boston. Now the Palm Beach Post is claiming that a tentative deal has been reached that will send ManRam to the Fish and net the Sox Jason Bay to play left field and John Grabow as a lefty power arm out of the bullpen.

So, is a haul of Jason Bay and John Grabow proper compensation for Manny Ramirez -- not to mention the two throw-in prospects needed to get the deal done? No way. That being said, it's still absolutely the right thing to do if Theo Epstein wants to save the Sox' season.

It's not hard to remember the last time the Sox made a trade to shake things up and create momentum. Was Orlando Cabrera and Doug Mientkiewicz proper compensation for Nohhmaahhhh? Of course not. But it did help the Sox shore up a problem area and spiced up the team's lineup for the playoff push.

Bay would serve to do the same thing in 2007. He's note Manny Ramirez, but he's a hard-nosed player who's never had a shot at playing for anything of merit. He has the power to contribute to the Sox lineup, and he could become a significant wall-shot producer ala Mike Lowell. Grabow, who could contribute out of the pen, is hardly a bail-out fireman, but he should be an upgrade in an area that the team needs any help it can get.

The bigger issue, to be sure, is just getting rid of Manny. He's long since worn out his welcome, but his productivity was always seen as a quantitative reason to keep him around. Well, ManRam isn't hitting the way he did four years ago. Sure, missing his bat will be a big blow, but missing his day-in, day-out circus will be a huge boon to the psyche of a team that just seems exhausted from trying to come up with new rationalizations for why its power-hitting leftfielder is a complete space cadet.

Like all passionate relationships, there will eventually be a period of mourning for Senor Ramirez. The fans will miss his sojourns into the Green Monster. They'll miss his truly sensational mental lapses in the outfield -- cutting off a throw from center Manny? Really? And, more than anything else, they'll miss all the majestic shots he sent over the Monster, occasionally drilling a baseball on to the Mass Pike, reminding passing motorists that Kenmore Square is just over that bridge on the left.

So we'll see you later Manny. Good luck in South Florida and then, wherever you may end up (Queens? Southside of Chicago? L.A.?). Red Sox fans will be watching, and Boston will be missing you. Eventually. For now, Sox fans will be happy to see someone else in left for a change. Maybe they'll actually hustle their way into avoiding a double play for a change.