Posts Tagged ‘David Ortiz’

At least they didn't rub his head

I wouldn’t say that I dislike the Indians but I’ll say this:  After the bush move of bringing Josh Beckett’s ex-girlfriend in to sing during the ALCS, I would imagine Beckett doesn’t think much of them.  So while the logical part of my brain says Beckett wouldn’t be so stupid as to hit Shelley Duncan and Shin-Soo Choo on purpose because the team has been struggling and putting men on base is pretty damn stupid, I can imagine a scenario where every so often Beckett would feel like he could get a little personal justice with no one being the wise – and maybe the Indians felt like they finally got wise.

Or did they?  Duncan got hit in the first inning with a man on and two outs.  While I suppose you could stretch it and say Beckett was mad because he struck out the first two batters he faced and then Choo got a hit before Duncan GOT hit, I think that’s a bit of a stretch.  Then in the third, Lou Marson hits a first pitch home run and then in five pitches Beckett gets the first two outs of the inning.  Was Beckett mad about the homer and taking it out on Choo three batters later just because he has good numbers against Beckett?  Again, this all seems like a bit of a stretch.  The Mason homer made the score 2-1 Red Sox but the Sox still had the lead and Beckett still had two outs.  Makes no sense to me.

Of course, regardless of intent I get that some teams feel like two of your guys getting hit in a game is cause for some kind of retaliation.  I don’t agree, because how many games have we all watched when something like that happens and it’s obvious there was no reason behind it and the game just goes on?  In any event, hit your guy and get it over with.  David Ortiz and Adrian Beltre both came up to bat in the bottom of the third inning.  Then they came up again in the fifth.    Ortiz appeared in the bottom of the 7th, and they threw behind him.  It was so obvious it was ridiculous.  It reminded me of when the Mets finally got their chance and threw at Roger Clemens.  In the bottom of the 8th, the Indians made a pitching change and decided to sacrifice Jensen Lewis to the Baseball Gods by having him throw behind Adrian Beltre .  It’s worth noting that neither Ortiz nor Beltre were ever actually hit by a pitch.  Throwing behind one guy sends a message.  Throwing behind two shows the world that you just didn’t do it right the first (nor the second) time.  Ortiz got it by the feet but Mr. Lewis was stupid enough to throw his pitch behind Beltre’s head.  Beltre did this great staring thing at Lewis as he approached the mound and then as people were pushing him away.  Lewis probably had nightmares last night that involved Adrian Beltre and his psycho eyes.  Here’s a tip, Indians:  If you’re throwing at someone, hit them and be done with it.  (Or throw behind one guy and be done with it.)  You didn’t look “tough” last night, you looked inept.   On the other hand, I should be thanking Manny Acta because his making his pitchers throw at our guys caused one of the more exciting, non-baseball moments at Fenway this season.  Beckett lost his mind on Shelley Duncan and  for a moment I really believe Terry Francona was going to take on the entire Indians team all by himself.

If the non-fight provided the excitement for the night, Mike Lowell provided the pure happiness.  NESN decided to let us hear Fenway Park public address announcer Carl Beane announce Mike Lowell’s first at-bat in the second inning.  We barely had enough time to process the enormous ovation the fans were giving him before he knocked the first pitch he saw into the Monster Seats.  (If you watch the video, you can actually hear Jerry Remy laughing while Orsillo is calling it…even the RemDawg got giddy!)

I have no idea what the rest of this season will bring and what we’ll all be doing in October…but if you’re a baseball fan and can’t appreciate the absolute beauty of Mike Lowell’s first at-bat last night, then you have no heart.  Remy later called it the “nicest” moment of the season and while it’s a bit of an understatement, I totally agree.  This team might be beaten and battered but don’t tell me they don’t have any heart and don’t tell me they aren’t fun to watch or worth rooting for.

Remember the good old days, Jason? When fans were just happy you weren't pushing around old guys? (Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.)

Let’s not dwell on the Sox losing the series in Oakland or the idea that Papi’s slow start to begin the second half is going to be the cause of another round of “Papi is toast” stories from the laziness that is most Boston sports writers.  Let’s dwell on someone else’s pain for a change.  Have you been following the season Jason Bay is having this year?

I like Bay.  Hell, I even like his nickname.  (”JayBay” fits him, doesn’t it?)  While I didn’t want the Sox giving him some crazy multi-year, high numbered contract, I was a little bummed to see him go to the Mets.  (Better the Mets than the Yankees I thought at the time.  Man, was I wrong.)  I liked Bay when he was in Pittsburgh and when he was traded to the Sox I was amazed that Theo had been able to make the trade not only for a decent player but for someone the fans would have a hard time disliking, even though he was replacing a Red Sox great.  Dude wasn’t going to win a Gold Glove playing at Fenway but he had a strong bat, a good personality to deal with the fans and the media, and darn it people just liked him.

So what the hell has happened in New York?

Been a bit of a fan of the Mets for a while and from that fondness for the team I’ve made some friends who also happen to be Mets fans.  To say that they write not nice things about JayBay would be understating it greatly.  Where Red Sox fans (and Pirates fans) always looked to Bay with  hope (if he was up we always felt he had a great chance of getting on base), it’s the complete opposite with the Mets fans.  A Twitter account called “MetsFail” tweeted this last night:

Jason Bay is so lost, he should fly home on Oceanic Airlines flight 815

(For those of you not familiar with the reference, it’s about the television show “Lost” not any real airplane tragedy.)

There are sarcastic tweets about being surprised that JayBay struck out (he has 87 strike outs in 92 games) and folks question the decision of the Mets to give him $66 million over 4 years on a daily basis.  What the Red Sox knew was that Bay could be a good, solid player for them but he wasn’t going to be a superstar or the guy who tipped the scales for Boston.  New York felt differently so while on paper Bay’s season isn’t horrid, it certainly isn’t close to being the production that the Mets expected.

Much like our Big Papi, Bay is struggling in the month of July.  While Boston writers will start with their talk of David Ortiz being too old and out of shape and “done” the New York press gets to moan about that contract Omar Minaya gave Bay.  The Mets were expecting home runs out of Bay and he hasn’t come through.  He’s hit six so far this season.   I can’t blame Mets fans for being disappointed in that kind of production from the guy who was supposed to bolster their offense.

My friend Caryn over at Metsgrrl tweeted this last night (she’s on a road trip and witnessed it in person):

Dbacks fan yells “thank you for leaving Boston” at Bay.

Ouch.

So, sure the Red Sox are struggling and the view into October looks dim, but things could always be worse! (For perspective, the Mets are 6.5 games out of first place in the NL East and are in second place.  The Sox are 7 games out of first place in the AL East and are in third place.)

John Lackey gets to pitch against a guy with a much worse ERA than his…it’s a 10:10pm ET start that has the possibility to last a very long time.  Stock up on the Red Bull!

This is the face America saw all night last night! Courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.

“It’s meaningless!” “It’s stupid!” “It’s boring!” “I can’t stand to listen to Chris Berman yelling ‘Back! Back! Back!’ all night!”

Whatever the reasons, many people don’t like the Home Run Derby.  I’m not one of them.  While it isn’t my favorite attraction that MLB gives us, there is something entertaining not only in watching the home runs but in watching the players interact and react to the home runs.

Last night, David Ortiz once again showed why he has such a place of honor in Major League Baseball.  Not because he won the contest but because of how he acted during it all.  Knowing that a good final outing by Hanley Ramirez would mean he lost the Derby, Papi was still out there encouraging him and cheering him on (telling Erin Andrews later that Hanley is like a son to him!).  It was quite the sight and something that seemed to take the ESPN guys (Yes, America, Bobby Valentine really did call him “Jose Ortiz” and then try to laugh it off by saying “I hope his middle name is Jose”) by surprise.

Tonight is the All Star Game and while I genuinely don’t care who wins, I just want the Sox to represent well, I hope folks watch and are entertained.  I won’t be able to watch tonight due to a family issue but I know folks will keep me posted in case Adrian Beltre takes out Joe Girardi.

Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission

I don’t normally like to focus on the guys who always get focused on but, screw it, how about that David Ortiz?

Against Detroit, New York, Minnesota, Philadelphia and Tampa Bay, five series that everyone kept saying would “make or break” the Red Sox, Big Papi hit .400.  Over the last ten games, he has 14 hits, four home runs, 12 RBI and even 5 walks.  The guy is getting on base and scoring runs (eight in that 10-game stretch) and isn’t considered the easy out that he was back in April.  He was just a major contributor to the Red Sox sweep against the mighty Tampa Bay Rays and helped the Sox outscore them 19-3 in this series.

There are no more excuses.  You can’t tell me he was facing weak pitching (Phil Hughes, CC Sabathia, Joba Chamberlain, James Shields, Matt Garza…these guys are good, yes?) and you can’t blame Fenway for being an easy home run park (out of his last ten games, only one was played at Fenway where, admittedly, he had a a two-run home run against Scott Baker).  Whatever Papi didn’t have in April, he has now, in spades.  Welcome back, Large Father.

The rest of the team?  Not too shabby either.  Adrian Beltre went insane on the first place Rays’ pitching.  The team won this last series, pardon me, swept this last series, with their hitting and their pitching…how nice is it when that happens?

According to Michael Silverman, Papi will  possibly be in Queens today at the wake for his friend Jose Lima.  If that happens to be the case, I can’t imagine anyone could complain if it causes him to miss the game tonight.  I know I won’t.

Too many were so quick to write this team off and while I know there is still a lot of baseball in front of us and anything is possible I continue to have that good feeling that this summer is going to be one heck of a ride.  Sweeping the Rays, winning the series in Philly, sweeping the Twins, splitting with the Yanks (that’s a record of 8-2 if you don’t want to do the math)…this is just the beginning.

Best line of the night, uttered by Jerry Remy in the 9th inning:

“You can almost see them coming together as a group!”

So long, Scott, and good luck! Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.

So very happy to hear that Darnell McDonald got a reprieve from the governor yesterday. That isn’t to say that I’m happy that poor Scott Atchison got the axe, but I’m really quite pleased that Darnell is still with the team. (Jacoby possibly still being injured? Doesn’t please me at all…but I’ll take what I can get right now.)

Last night the Sox one-hit the Rays, winning a game where the Sox only got four hits and two runs. A well-pitched, low-scoring game against the best team in the league and the Sox came out on top. Definitely reason to be happy today.

As there usually is with the Sox/Rays series, there was a little drama last night too. Pleasantly, it didn’t directly involve the Red Sox.  It still baffles me that Carl Crawford would be stupid enough to get himself thrown out of a game in the fifth inning on a first pitch called strike. Crawford is the best hitter on that team right now and they were facing a good pitcher but only down by two in the fifth. I don’t care how terrible the call was (and it was a terrible call), act like a professional and suck it up.  You don’t get yourself thrown out of the game in that situation, you just don’t.  Excluding the 17.5 games behind the Orioles are (sorry Baltimore!), Tampa Bay’s lead in the division is 6.5 games now.  The Rays aren’t far enough ahead of the rest of the pack to not care about losing their best player because he gets pissy about a bad call.   They’ve happened all season, they’ve happened since the game began, they will always happen.  Was hurting your team worth it?  Carl Crawford seems to think so:

As for getting as angry as he did, Crawford said, “He didn’t back down, and I didn’t want to lose a trash-talking contest.”

If I were running the Rays, Crawford would get fined for that comment. That’s genius right there. It was more important to be a big man than to help your team try to win the game? Ridiculous.

Had a Red Sox player done this I’m fairly certain my brain would have exploded.

Speaking of things that make my head hurt…there is no possible way I could care less about how long David Ortiz takes to round the bases after he hits a home run.  None.  As I’ve written many places, if you don’t want a player doing what you consider a disrespectful trot, don’t throw the damn home run ball in the first place.  The parade of people constantly looking for negative things to write about David Ortiz is getting very tiring.  The team loves him, the fans love him, stop trying to find reasons to dislike him, you’re all only embarrassing yourselves at this point.

Red Sox are now six for six on Tuesday night live chats night.   As always, thank you to everyone who participated!  Same time, next week!

Three afternoon MLB games today and the Twins and Yankees pick up last night’s game at 5:05pm ET in the top of the 6th…so there is plenty of baseball to enjoy before we sit back and watch John Lackey take on Matt Garza tonight for what could be a sweep of the AL East leaders.  Until then, if you’re in the Boston area, it’s a gorgeous day, go out and enjoy it!

Mike Cameron gets another start in Portland today. Come back soon, Mike! Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.

I started with a couple of tweets just before the game began last night, and as it began I had to go offline for a while.  Come around the fourth inning and I decide to go online when I realized that Daisuke Matsuzaka hadn’t given up a hit yet.  That’s when I made the decision to keep doing what I was doing and not go online.  Why mess with the mojo? 

It was about the 7th inning that I got this nagging feeling that he wouldn’t get his no-hitter.  Something just didn’t feel right (and none of that was his pitching or the defense behind him).  Maybe it was being in Philadelphia?  Or that the national broadcasters were calling the game not our Jerry and Don?  Whatever it was, when he lost the no-hit bid in the 8th, I was still disappointed but also still so proud.  Over the past four games, three of our pitches threw 8 complete innings.  For any team this is great but it’s especially important and impressive for the way the Red Sox pitching staff has been going.  Daisuke, someone who gets the wrath of many Red Sox fans and is the topic of many nasty emails sent my way from opposing fans, really came through and showed everyone what he was capable of.  He might not have gotten his no-hitter, just yet, but he definitely made folks in and around MLB stand up and take notice.

I had a discussion online not too long ago with someone who said that the Sox got hosed when the picked up Daisuke and he wasn’t worth his money.  When I countered that, in my opinion, his first two seasons alone with the Sox were definitely worth the money (one of those seasons was the championship 2007 season and the other was 2008 when he had 18 wins), the person still disagreed with me.  I’ll say it again, in terms of “baseball” money (read:  money I don’t have and can pretend to spend any way I like) and for what he has contributed, I still think Daisuke was worth it.  Doesn’t mean that I don’t sometimes get fits when he’s on the mound, but I think the fits, at times, can defitely be worth it as well to see the end result.  Injured in 2009 and off to a late start in 2010 – we still haven’t seen everything he’ capable of.  Also, he pitched this one-hit game against possibly the best hitting team in baseball.  That is pretty damned impressive, no?

Also, props need to go to all the defense last night, but especially David Ortiz if for no other reason than he made a couple of really good plays that finally got the Fox broadcasters to shut up about how he was going to fail at first because he never plays the position.

With Josh Beckett on the dl, today Tim Wakefield pitches the rubber game against Roy Halladay at 1:35pm.  Both NESN and TBS are carrying the game because TBS, unlike Fox, doesn’t screw up everyone else’s baseball viewing pleasure just for their own greedy selves. Last night was a travesty in that there were actually people in MASSACHUSETTS who couldn’t watch the Sox play because their local Fox station decided to show the Mets/Yanks game.  Absolutely ridiculous Fox.  Good God when is that horrendous contract over?

Some folks have been using the new message board to in-game chat either in threads or in the built-in chat room so go on over if you’re so inclined!  Tuesday night live chats (and at some point maybe more) will still be held here – can’t mess with that magic yet!