More Manny (to be continued, I'm sure)

Did Manny intentionally sit on those three pitches?

Dan Shaughnessy, Globe Columnist, on July 19, 2008 wrote:

When told of Lobel's accusation regarding Manny's passive pinch-hitting appearance, Francona asked, "Where'd he come up with that?"
"It's ridiculous and incendiary for anyone to suggest that Manny would purposefully make an out in any game," Henry wrote in an e-mail. "Ridiculous."
Lucchino wasn't buying, either.
"I'm not going to dignify that with a response," he said. "This is Boston and this is the big leagues. A lot of things get created out of whole cloth, and we've got to appreciate that things like this happen from time to time."
Manny's strikeout against Rivera certainly looked bad, but it's impossible to get into the head of any ballplayer. Nobody said Bob "Beetle" Bailey was tanking when he took three down the middle against Rich Gossage in the 1978 playoff game.
In fairness to Manny, all three strikes he watched were nasty cutters on the black. No one looks good when they go down looking at three strikes, but it's risky to accuse an athlete of tanking.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/19/08

Ken Rosenthal is an ass. Manny's OK by me (so far.)

Ken Rosenthal is an ass. That he opines for Fox is more proof of his mediocrity as a journalist or sportscaster. I'm sure the NY Daily Fish Wrap will snap him up once his tenure at Fox is over. This is not the first time I've read some of his garbage and said, 'wtf?'

That article of his serves absolutely no purpose at all other than to stir up shit in Boston. (Is he from NY?) There is no new information in that article, there are no new revelations about what Manny said or what could happen to him. Nothing. Nada. Zippo. Zilch. Zito.

Rosenthal writes, "It's mostly pointless to analyze the comments of a player who demonstrates the maturity and attention span of a 12-year-old." So why is he even writing this?

As for having "the maturity and attention span of a 12-year-old", we already know that Manny marches to the beat of a different drummer. Manny is one of those guys, to quote Jimmy Buffett, who is "growing older, but not up." I know. I'm also one of those guys. As for growing older, Manny is doing it, but at a much, much slower pace than the rest of us, that's for sure. Thirty-six is not that old anymore for a well-conditioned ball player. (At 36, I was still going on 30 mile, 2500' elevation gain mountain bike rides, and skiing down double black diamonds at Tahoe. At 46, I was still playing drums in 6 hour jam sessions.) His work ethic and conditioning have been well documented. His production at the plate has been well documented. His performance on the field is much better than most realize. He is virtually guaranteed a spot in Cooperstown. Yes, he is a clown and a buffoon at times, but ask me if there is a stronger 3-4 combination in MLB. He's had his transgressions, but he has also apologized and paid for them.

Baseball fans all over the country love to dump on Manny, as they did to Barry, but I know their feelings would be much different if either had been clubbing all those taters at their team's park.

As for his most recent comments that po'd John Henry, how about letting the dust settle so you can see exactly what is happening before starting to spew?

I read what Manny said, but I have not heard a recording of it. (Much can be lost or changed from spoken word to printed word.)

I think this could be another photo of Rosenthal when he was taking a break from writing that hit-piece.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/18/08

How Many Out There in RSN Said "YES!" When They Heard Lugo's Going on the DL?

Lenny Megliola of The MetroWest Daily News in Milford, MA just posted a great piece about Lugo and, Cora, and Lowrie, and the recent history of Sox shortstop's short stays in Beantown.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/17/08

Top baseball salaries

From newsday.com today:

Top 50 salaries in Major League Baseball for 2008.

1) Alex Rodriguez, New York Yankees, $28,000,000
2) Jason Giambi, New York Yankees, $23,428,571
3) Derek Jeter, New York Yankees, $21,600,000
4) Manny Ramirez, Boston Red Sox, $18,929,923
5) Carlos Beltran, New York Mets, $18,622,810
6) Ichiro Suzuki, Seattle Mariners, $17,102,149
7) Johan Santana, New York Mets, $16,984,216
8) Todd Helton, Colorado Rockies, $16,600,000
9) Torii Hunter, Los Angeles Angels, $16,500,000
10) Carlos Zambrano, Chicago Cubs, $16,000,000
11) dl-Andy Pettitte, New York Yankees, $16,000,000
12) Bobby Abreu, New York Yankees, $16,000,000
13) Carlos Delgado, New York Mets, $16,000,000
14) Mike Hampton, Atlanta Braves, $15,975,185
15) Magglio Ordonez, Detroit Tigers, $15,768,175
16) Rafael Furcal, Los Angeles Dodgers, $15,730,196
17) Jim Thome, Chicago White Sox, $15,666,667
18) Tim Hudson, Atlanta Braves, $15,500,000
19) Richie Sexson, Seattle Mariners, $15,500,000
20) Vladimir Guerrero, Los Angeles Angels, $15,500,000
21) Aramis Ramirez, Chicago Cubs, $15,250,000
22) dl-Jason Schmidt, Los Angeles Dodgers, $15,217,401
23) Sdl-Randy Johnson, Arizona Diamondbacks, $15,100,546
24) Mariano Rivera, New York Yankees, $15,000,000
25) Miguel Tejada, Houston Astros, $14,811,415
26) Andruw Jones, Los Angeles Dodgers, $14,726,911
27) Lance Berkman, Houston Astros, $14,500,000
28) Barry Zito, San Francisco Giants, $14,500,000
29) Pat Burrell, Philadelphia Phillies, $14,250,000
30) dl-John Smoltz, Atlanta Braves, $14,000,000
31) J.D. Drew, Boston Red Sox, $14,000,000
32) Alfonso Soriano, Chicago Cubs, $14,000,000
33) Mark Buehrle, Chicago White Sox, $14,000,000
34) Albert Pujols, St. Louis Cardinals, $13,870,950
35) Troy Glaus, St. Louis Cardinals, $13,500,000
36) Adrian Beltre, Seattle Mariners, $13,400,000
37) Gary Sheffield, Detroit Tigers, $13,326,306
38) Derrek Lee, Chicago Cubs, $13,250,000
39) A.J. Burnett, Toronto Blue Jays, $13,200,000
40) Jorge Posada, New York Yankees, $13,100,000
41) David Ortiz, Boston Red Sox, $13,000,000
42) Hideki Matsui, New York Yankees, $13,000,000
43) Johnny Damon, New York Yankees, $13,000,000
44) Roy Oswalt, Houston Astros, $13,000,000
45) Adam Dunn, Cincinnati Reds, $13,000,000
46) Garret Anderson, Los Angeles Angels, $12,600,000
47) Frank Thomas, Toronto Blue Jays, $12,560,000
48) Carlos Lee, Houston Astros, $12,500,000
49) Mark Teixeira, Atlanta Braves, $12,500,000
50) Mike Lowell, Boston Red Sox, $12,500,000

That's over $700 million bucks, folks. I'll be voicing my thoughts on player's salaries in the future, but for now~ read 'em and weep.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/17/08

10 Keys to the Back Half

1 Tek’s bat~ We’re not expecting him to hit .295 as he was on May 25th, but ‘Tek needs to get his swing back.

2 Bullpen’s arms~ Oki, not so doki this year. Part of it is that batters are now seeing him for the 2nd season. While his ERA is a respectable 2.82, it is not a complete picture. He needs to get his splitter fixed. Aardsma has been great. Timlin, Delcarmen and Hansen however need to be more consistent. They’ve had great performances, followed by disasters.

3 Papi’s bat~ Let’s hope that his wrist has healed, and that the time off also helped his knees. BP looked good, but Papi needs to come back hitting like he did post slump.

4 Beckett and Dice-K~ Beckett’s pitching mostly well, but he’s not consistently overpowering this year as last. Dice-K has great numbers and an uncanny ability to wiggle out of jams, but those free passes and high pitch counts are giving fans, coaches, and managers grey hair, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol.

5 Pap’s mouth~ Yes, he is one of the elite closers, but off field remarks and antics cannot overshadow on field performances. Have fun on and off the field, but make sure you’re not stirring up anything unsavory that spills onto the field. Save the theatrics for post-season and post-career.

6 Shortstop~ Hopefully Lowrie will shine in Lugo’s absence. Let’s also hope that upon his eventual return to the line-up, Lugo will have also worked on whatever is causing his on field brain farts, and get hit BA back up to .290 or better.

7 Centerfield~ Tito has done a fantastic job of getting decent playing time to both Crisp and Ellsbury. Ellsbury is the rookie and should be satisfied with his playing time. If Crisp can accept his given role this year, (as it is looking like he may not get traded during this season), keep a clear head, and play to the best of his abilities (i.e. get his BA back up to .290 or better), the outfield will still be good.

8 Manny Being Manny~ Manny’s numbers are up this year. That’s a good thing. He’s a better fielder than most give him credit for. That’s a good thing. But I’m just a bit concerned over a couple of recent incidents. One day he’s looking all happy-go-lucky high-fiving fans, and having fun in the green monster, etc., and the next he’s having scuffles with teammates and office personnel. Those are the actions people will recall before the antics and hijinx. I don’t really care what players do in their personal lives, but if he’s got something is going on that we don’t know about (nor do we need to know about) that affects his public behavior and playing field performance, he needs to deal with it. (Same goes for all players.)

9 No more injuries! DL so far this year: Lowell, Dice-K, Papi, Schilling, Colon, Timlin…

10 Business as usual for Pedroia, Youk, Drew, Wake, Lester, & Lowell.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/17/08

Did Navarro Purposely Blow the 8th Inning?

Maybe it’s the innocent little kid in me, but that thought *never* occurred to me last night watching the game. This is a comment made in response to Chad Finn’s “Touching All the Bases” on boston.com yesterday:

"I'm kind of shocked that I haven't seen any coverage on Navarro's role in the 8th inning last night. (Feel free to point me in the right direction if you've seen any articles on this) I can't be the only one thinks he tanked that throw to second on Tejada's steal on purpose. That guy is too good a player to blow the throw that bad. Worse yet, he throws a perfect strike to second in the ninth with Rivera on the mound. And just to make matters worse, the guy made no effort to slap a tag on Tejada on the sac fly. I doubt he could have gotten Tejada, but he could have made it close by at least trying to make a play. Even my Yankee fan buddy called me right away to say he thought Navarro tanked that eighth on purpose!Any Sox fan who doesn't think that Navarro didn't catch that eighth inning last night with a chip on his shoulder after the Sox/Rays scuffle and Papelbon's comments are lying to themselves. To me, that was the story of the night that I'm not seeing anyone talk about."

At the time last night, I thought, ‘high pressure situation, young catcher, 1st ASG, yadda…’, but after reading this today, I began to wonder. Maybe the yankee fans booing Pap *while he was pitching* put the idea in Navarro’s head. I don’t know. Yankee fans (the only reason I capitalized it this time is because it’s the first word of the sentence) continue to lower themselves while being led into the fandom hall of shame, or maybe they’re leading the local mullet wrapper down that road.

Whatever it is, Navarro stepped in it and now the whole world is wondering did he purposely put up a brick to get back at the Sox for the events of last month? If he did, whatever he stepped in will need to be wiped off his cleats by the whole team of the (yankee wannabe) Tampa Bay Rays.

Poetic justice~ Drew wins the MVP in the last ASG to be played at the venerable Yankee Stadium. If goddess forbid, the yanks or the rays make it to the World Series, and win it, then it would be proven that ‘karma’ does not exist. But if either of those two teams realistically think that they have any chance of making it to the Series, then they had better take a hard look at Navarro’s selfish little ego trip last night, and the potential loss of home advantage that might have ensued. Fortunately for the AL, Pap was on the mound and negated the shoddy playing of the rays catcher.

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/16/08

JD Drew On the Mound?!

Terry Francona was running out of pitchers fast. He was down to his last pitcher, Scott Kazmir of the Tampa Bay Rays. The Tampa Bay manager would have preferred that he not pitch at all, since he hurled over 100 pitches on Sunday and is scheduled to pitch again soon, but when you’re into the 15th inning of the All Star Game, a manager doesn’t have many choices left. Fortunately, Kazmir got through his inning and the Red Sox All Star Team, er, make that the AL All Star Team scored a run in the bottom of that inning to win the game. Here’s what Francona had to say if he needed another pitcher after Kazmir:

"You know, you wait a lot of your life to do something like this," Francona said. "And in the last two hours, it wasn't a whole lot of fun. I was very nervous. I actually was more nervous before the game than I ever thought I would be. You know, but an excitable, you know, nervousness. It was fun to be part of something so special. And then later on, [I] started to have panic set in."
That's because he had run out of pitching. Rays lefty Scott Kazmir came on for the top of the 15th, and Francona had nobody left. And Kazmir was not in a position to throw all night, having thrown 104 pitches on Sunday.
In fact, Francona hadn't even planned on using Kazmir until the desperation set in. One thing nobody wanted was a tie.
So Kazmir blanked the NL in that top of the 15th, and Michael Young's walk-off sacrifice fly in the bottom of the inning prevented he ace from having to throw another inning.
"I mean, we got to the point where [Tigers manager] Jimmy Leyland saw him, came down to the dugout just to check, and I asked him if he could pitch," Francona said. "It wasn't a real fun situation. I mean, that's just it was you try so hard to win and get everybody in. I thought we excelled at that, because we used everybody. We did a great job of using everybody."
And if the game had dragged on a few innings more, Francona confessed that he might have been forced to put his right fielder, J.D. Drew, on the pitcher's mound and send Evan Longoria -- the designated hitter -- into the outfield. Drew wound up winning the Most Valuable Player by belting a two-run homer, adding a single and stealing a base.
"He might have been a little more of an MVP if we went a couple more innings," said Francona. "He might have pitched. He's been begging me a long time to pitch, and we almost got close. But we were still a ways away from that."

Drew would have welcomed the opportunity.
"I've given him a hard time for the couple years that I played for him, if he ever runs out [of pitching], just give me a holler out here," said Drew. "We would have seen what happened. But after it started to [become a possibility], I was a little bit nervous to be honest with you."

Previously posted on FenwayWest.com 07/16/08