No Worries

It's become a dead and beaten horse that the Red Sox have stood pat this offseason. We didn't make any real big moves except to resign some key parts to last year's team. Now, in most cases that would be a problem, a la White Sox of 2006. No big moves, no big trophies. But I'm not worried about us for a bunch of reasons.

Reason Number One: Our young guys. Last year we did not get a full season's worth of production out of Jacoby Ellsbury, Jon Lester, or Clay Bucholz. With the loss of Curt Schilling, it opens up room in the rotation for Lester and Bucholz to make an impact. With the emergence of Ellsbury, it creates a position battle (something a team can only benefit from) in CF. We've also got a young IF, Jed Lowrie knocking on the door ready to make an impact at the big league level. He's a shortstop, and that brings me to my next point.

Reason Number Two: Drew and Lugo can't really get any worse. Both had pretty crappy seasons by anybody's standards, but both also picked it up big time in the second half. Lugo batted close to .300 after the break, and Drew went on quite a streak the last month and a half, and into the playoffs (see October 26th). This year, if Lugo continues to suck it up, Lowrie should be ready to make the leap, and we've also got Kielty all season long (i'm assuming he makes it out of camp due to a Coco trade) to spell the injury prone Drew (don't look at my hammies for too long! they might be strained from reflecting all that light into your retinas!!)

Reason Number Three: Theo does all the little things. What GM is better at making little moves that pan out real big. David Ortiz off of wavers, Bill Mueller signed as a free agent, Bobby Kielty given a minor league deal. This year, Theo picks up Sean Casey, a career .300+ hitter to spell Youk and Lowell. He grabs Bartolo Colon off the scrap heap to help us out sans Schilling. Apparently we might get Freddy Garcia for the same reason. And Coco might even land us an arm out of (reportedly) Chicago for the back end of the rotation. I think Theo has finally learned his lesson from the Whiffy Mo Pena trade that you can never have too much pitching. Hopefully, Schilling is able to come back around August so he's ready for domination in October.

Reason Number Four: The Yankees didn't do Jack Squat either. This is probably the most comforting thing in my mind. The Yankees did even less than we did. They're pinning their hopes on a rotation with three guys in it that have never pitched 200 major league innings, let alone 200 innings in a season at any level. They've got two left-fielders and no first basemen. Bobby Abreu is afraid of walls. Derek Jeter has been statistically proven to be just about the worst defensive shortstop ever. And there's no way that Jorge has a year like last year. Then there's that one other thing. Mr. Mitchell sure did put a huge old elephant in the corner of the Yankees clubhouse. Although I do have to say that Andy Pettite couldn't have handled this situation with more class or poise. But still, may the fallout from the Mitchell report have precipitous effects on the Yankees records.

Finally, can I just say that I love watching local announcers? I've got the YES network on, watching the Yanks and Phils. So far, they've talked about the Iron Pigs ("Why do they call them pigs? I can' understand the Iron part, I think."), loud Philly fans ("Just listen to him! Stretching his larnyx like that. It's amazing."), and now they just zoomed in on the concession stand menu checking out the prices. The only way this could get better is if John Madden hops into the booth. Wait, it just did get a little better. As the game ends in a tie the announcer says "It's been an afternoon of kissing your sister!"

And as a parting word, I'd just like to say welcome to our newest nation member. I think you'll enjoy us, Hank. Please use those Monster seat tickets, we'd LOVE to see you there!