Beckett Banged Up

Posted by Mike Giardi August 19, 2008 (2 days ago) at 6:30 pm

You want to know why Terry Francona sometimes looks pale, almost gray? It’s days like these my friends. Ace Josh Beckett has been pushed back from his next scheduled start from Saturday to Tuesday in Yankee Stadium, and even that’s tentative.

“It’s still seven days away, so we’ll see,” Beckett said from Baltimore.

Apparently, Beckett’s been dealing with numbness in his right ring finger and pinky on and off for the entire season.

“I have some numbness in fingers I’m not used to having,” he said. “It’s just that we’ve got to figure out what the hell it was … It’s something we’ve dealt with but I’ve never had to deal with it on that level.”

Beckett’s last outing was an epic disaster. He didn’t escape of the third inning, getting tagged for 8 hits and 8 runs. It was his worst start since 2006, when he got bombed in the Bronx. This has been very uneven campaign for Beckett, who has flirted with the form he flashed a season ago, but has not consistently delivered on that excellence. Perhaps now we know why.

The Sox have survived injuries to Daisuke, Mike Lowell (twice), Ortiz and Julio Lugo, but I find it hard to believe they could handle any prolonged absence from Beckett. That starting rotation has been stretched thin, and there don’t appear to be any options available that could make people forget baseball’s only 20-game winner from 2007.

 

Tippett praises former teammates

Posted by Reiss' Pieces August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 5:28 pm

CANTON, Ohio – Andre Tippett just spoke with members of the press here at the McKinley Grand Hotel, and he was asked – now that he’s in town – what it means to share this moment with his past teammates, specifically those on non-Super Bowl caliber teams.

“I was real fortunate to play with some really, really good football players," he responded. "I don’t think we had the success, continuously, that we thought we would have. I don’t think that after going to Super Bowl XX, any of us envisioned not being able to get back again. We thought we would have a few more years competing at that level.

“But, as all my classmates will attest to, we don’t get here unless we have great people that are around us, great teammates. I had some great teammates over the years, specifically some of the linebackers that I’ve played with. I played with some great guys in Steve Nelson and Don Blackmon. Without Don Blackmon, I really wouldn’t be here today because he was as good as some of the greatest linebackers to play the game.

“We had some great defenses for about a six-year period. As I go in, and people celebrate me, you celebrate those guys that were there [with me].”

Out with the boy, in with an adult

Posted by Ted McEnroe August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 5:02 pm

The jury may be out on just how lopsided the Manny Ramirez for Jason Bay deal was from a pure talent standpoint (Mike Giardi and I can differ on that - we’ll miss Moss a little, Hansen not much at all in my opinion), but there’s no denying the sense of relief inside the Red Sox clubhouse.

Terry Francona looked positively giddy compared to the Tito we have seen in recent weeks - as he tried to defend a player his team had lost respect for.

And as for Bay - love the guy. First two words to the media? “Fire away.” And it turns out Bay has quietly been a member of the Red Sox Nation of the Allegheny (if there is such an organization). Back home in British Columbia growing up, his dad put him in a Red Sox onesie, and he hung posters of Carl Yastrzemski and Jim Rice in his bedroom growing up. He says he loved the atmosphere at Fenway when he was visiting as a Pirate, and praised Red Sox Nation up and down.

In short, he did more to build a relationship with the community in 9 minutes and 15 seconds than Manny Ramirez had done in the last three years.

Don’t get me wrong - I’m not really a Manny-basher. He was and is a big kid out there. Sometimes, you couldn’t help but be charmed by his antics and his genuine love for the game. Other times, though, he was a spoiled child, who needed a timeout or to be grounded — not an option when you’re the $20 million man in a playoff race.

This much is for certain - stats aside, the Red Sox sent a child off to Hollywood yesterday.

They got back a man.

Here’s the man meeting the media:

Bay: new to Fenway, but not to Red Sox Nation

Posted by NECN - Sports August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 4:36 pm

(NECN) - Jason Bay may be new to the Boston Red Sox, but he's no stranger to the Sox fan base. He grew up in it.

"I had a Red Sox onesie when I was growing up," the Britich Columbia native told reporters, noting that his father was a diehard Sox fan.

In his bedroom as a kid? Posters of Jim Rice and Carl Yastrzemski.

And Bay remembers his only trip to Fenway as a member of the Red Sox, for the atmosphere - and the rendition of 'Sweet Caroline'. He noted the atmosphere between Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, where the Pirates visited on the trip, was totally different.

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Theo, Tito say Bay is a great fit

Posted by NECN - Sports August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 4:22 pm

(NECN) - Red Sox Manager Terry Francona and GM Theo Epstein held a press conference to discuss the recent block buster trade that sent Manny Ramirez to the Los Angeles Dodgers. It also sent Sox outfielder Brandon Moss and pitcher Craig Hansen to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

In the three team-deal, the Red Sox acquired outfielder Jason Bay from the Pirates. Bay will be introduced Friday night against the Oakland A's. Bay will be hitting in the number 5 spot, behind Mike Lowell.

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Bay: ‘I’m not going to be Manny’

Posted by NECN - Sports August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 4:12 pm

(NECN: Boston, Mass.) - "Fire away."

With those two words, Jason Bay met the Boston media for the first time in a Fenway Park news conference as a member of the Boston Red Sox. Bay says he arrived in Boston after a "sleepless" night, finding out only after the trade deadline passed at 4 p.m. that he had actually been shipped to Boston.

"I didn't know anything more than what everyone was writing," Bay told reporters about how he followed a day that had him reportedly shipped to Tampa at mid-afternoon, before the Boston trade was finalized.

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Francona: Team already looking ahead after trade

Posted by NECN - Sports August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 4:09 pm

(NECN: Boston, Mass.) - Prior to introducing jason bay as the newest member of the Boston Red Sox, Theo Epstein and Terry Francona met the media, and for the first time, Frnacona acknowledged that his team had lost its focus before the trade of Manny Ramirez. But he said the team was already looking ahead in a Friday afternoon team meeting.

"We discussed how we're going to go forward," Francona said of the meeting. "I thought it was an exciting time to stand in fromt of your players and feel like that."

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Epstein: Now we feel like a team

Posted by NECN - Sports August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 4:07 pm

(NECN) - Red Sox Manager Terry Francona and GM Theo Epstein held a press conference to discuss the recent block buster trade that sent Manny Ramirez to the Los Angeles Dodgers. It also sent Sox outfielder Brandon Moss and pitcher Craig Hansen to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

In the three team-deal, the Red Sox acquired outfielder Jason Bay from the Pirates. Bay will be introduced Friday night against the Oakland A's. Bay will be hitting in the number 5 spot, behind Mike Lowell.

read more

Tippett to speak first

Posted by Reiss' Pieces August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 3:22 pm

CANTON, Ohio -- Andre Tippett was considered a tone-setter when he played for the New England Patriots, and perhaps that's why the Pro Football Hall of Fame has selected him to be the first inductee to speak at Saturday's enshrinement ceremonies.

So for those planning to watch Tippett's induction speech on television, be advised that -- barring an unexpected change -- Tippett will be the first of the six inductees to address the crowd.

Television coverage, on ESPN and NFL Network, begins at 6 p.m. ET.

Still Feels the Same

Posted by Mike Giardi August 1, 2008 (3 weeks ago) at 8:07 am

So I’ve had a night to sleep on what the Sox did late yesterday afternoon. And my gut feeling now is the same as then: Theo had to do it, but boy, this deal sure reeks of desperation and looks not lopsided, but at least heavily listing in the Dodgers and Pirates favor.

At what point during all of this did you think the Sox would have to include two Major Leaguers (Hansen and Moss), and two draft picks that would have been in the top 40 (when the Sox offered Manny arbitration at the end of the season) and the 7 million dollars all to make sure Manny wasn’t in that clubhouse this afternoon?

You keep hearing addition by subtraction, and having been in that locker room this last week, there’s no question there’s validity to that comment. But now there are no more excuses, except for that inconsistent bullpen. The onus shifts directly onto the players, their manager, and - if this goes poorly - GM Theo Epstein and the ownership that green-lighted such a move. Not a comfortable spot to be in, especially in this ravenous region, but that’s why they get paid the big bucks. As I wrote sometime in the last 36 hours, this is another career-making trade for Theo, and despite the discontent with Manny over these last two months, fans and some in the media will write revisionist history should the season continue to go south.

Me, I continue to believe that the Sox may not be as talented an offensive team as they were the last time Francona wrote out the lineup card, but at least the clubhouse won’t have that festering stench caused by the sullen slugger. That could be huge, mentally, going forward. No more wondering if Manny will ask out of the lineup, or, like he did last Friday, ask to go on the DL with knees that checked out a-okay. No more having to look the other way when he jakes it down the first base line on a ground ball, like he did during Lackey’s near no-no. That almost caused both Dustin Pedroia and Terry Francona’s heads to simultaneously implode.

But the flip side is losing one of the best hitters in franchise - in baseball - history. Jason Bay can’t replace that, can he? Bay and Manny’s numbers are comparable, but until we see how the former Buc responds in this atmosphere, we still can’t answer the question: just how desperate was this deal?

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