Friday, April 8, 2011

Swept by the Indians......the Cleveland Indians

Red Sox Nation is ready to explode.  The Sox got swept by the Indians this week......yes, those Indians.  How is this possible?  Well, with lack of hitting and poor pitching anything is possible.  Just when you thought the Sox would have a chance to right the ship and get back to 3-3 or 2-4 at worst, the wheels fall off.  Unfortunately, the bums from the bronx are coming to town this weekend.  Maybe the ball club will be energized by the rivalry or the fans as the Sox open Fenway Park for the first time this season.  Surely they can win one in front of the home crowd.  Although I said the same thing about the Indians, there is hope following the Yankees series.  The 0-6 Sox will play the 0-6 Rays.  Something has to give.  You can't have a scoreless tie in baseball, right?  No team has ever won the World Series after starting 0-6, but you may recall that now team had ever won a series after going down 0-3, but we all remember that glorious comeback against the hated Yankees.  Ah, the joys of yesteryear.  Remember Sox fans, the season is a marathon, not a sprint.  We still have 156 games left.  By the end of April this little sputter out of the gate should be an afterthought.

On a much more positive note, the Cincinnati Reds are 5-1 for the first time since 1990 when they went wire-to-wire and won the World Series.  The Reds are hot right out of the gate and firing on all cylinders.  I don't see why they shouldn't win the Central this year and at least make the NLCS if they can manage to avoid a fiasco like the Phillies series last year.

Could two teams, that of course I'd like to see in the postseason, start off the season any different?  This is what makes baseball so exciting.  Go Red Sox and Go Reds!

Monday, April 4, 2011

Opening Weekend-Is the Season Over Already

The Red Sox got swept by the Texas Rangers and start the season 0-3 for the first time since 1996.  Tampa Bay starts 0-3 as well after losing Carl Crawford in the offseason and find out that superstar third baseman Evan Longoria has a strained oblique and is on the DL.  The Yankees start out hot….again and the O’s have run away with the East!  What?

The Red Sox have been picked by many to win the East and the World Series but are they over hyped?  This weekend was more of a testament to the hitting prowess of the Rangers.  Texas has 7 guys with at least 5 AB hitting over .300.  Although the starting pitching for the Red Sox (Lester, Lackey and Buchholtz) were far less than stellar, I’m not concerned…yet.  The good news for the Sox is that they start a series with the Indians, a team known to cure many ills.

The perplexing thing for me this weekend was Francona’s quick decision to move Crawford to the seven spot in the lineup.  Sure he had a bad weekend, but Crawford knows how to work through it.  He’ll be fine.

The good news for the Sox came by way of the bats of Adrian Gonzalez and Big Papi.  Gonzalez is hitting .385 with 3 RBI and Papi sent 2 balls screaming and drove in 4 just like the Papi we used to know.

The O’s had the perfect combination of a team on the decline in the Rays and superb pitching by some young stars.  Their three starters combined for 20 innings pitched giving up only 1 run and 6 hits while striking out 17.  Very impressive but I don’t expect those numbers all season.

Remember, the season is young so let’s climb down from the ledge and see what is to come.  I think we’ll find that everything will work out in the end.