DETROIT - Bring back Terry Francona? Why not bring back Joe Kerrigan, Butch Hobson, Dave Lewis, and Pete Carroll while we’re at it? Did Bobby Valentine have any idea what he was getting himself into? After an Opening Day of excruciating pain, followed by a 10-0 Game 2 blowout, the Red Sox Sunday bookended their Lost Weekend in Motown with a defeat as hideous as any of those we lived through in 2011. They wasted 12 runs and 18 hits. They wasted four spectacular innings of relief by Vicente Padilla. They wasted the emotional rescue of Bobby V’s counterculture lineup. They blew a three-run lead in the bottom of the ninth and a two-run lead in the bottom of the 11th. They lost, 13-12, when Alex Avila smashed a walkoff blast on a 2-and-2 pitch from Mark “Schiraldi Eyes’’ Melancon. It was as bad as it gets...
THE SKY IS FALLING...and here comes the "they should have signed Papelbon comment in 3, 2, 1,...
Three games into the season, it’s clear the Red Sox have no closer. Jonathan Papelbon is with the Phillies, Andrew Bailey is on the disabled list for four months. Aceves (five batters, all have reached including Miguel Cabrera with a three-run bomb Sunday) is making Johnny “Way Back’’ Wasdin look like Dick Radatz. And poor Melancon (two games, two losses) has the look of a kid who might have trouble recovering. Melancon faced all the tough questions after surrendering the walkoff blast on a hanging curve. He said he’ll have trouble sleeping. It was hard not to feel sorry for him.
Sox management is another story. Allegedly committed to redemption after the greatest choke in baseball history, the Sox have started this season with what looks like a grossly subpar pitching staff. They have the third-highest payroll in baseball and they have no closer, a raft of suspect middle men, and two of their front three starters spit the bit in Detroit.
There we go, thanks for coming out Shaughnessey. Don't overreact to 3 games or anything. It's not like last years team went 2-10 before rattling off the best June, July, and August in baseball. And before anyone confuses me with a rose glasses colored homer, trust me I'm not. I'm as reactionary as the rest of you, when it's time for that. But right now is not that time. The Sox just got swept by the Detroit Tigers, as in the same team that just played in the ALCS last year...they're pretty good. Their offense has the single best 1-2 punch since the Manny-Ortiz heyday (maybe better, to be honest) and their pitching staff, if not great, is a little better than ours.
Still, the Sox lost two games by a combined 2 runs, both in extra innings (yes they were blown out in game two, thank you Josh Beckett). Two runs people. If they give up 1 less run in the first nine yesterday they're 1-2 and today's columns are talking about how they've turned it around...but they didn't. They got off to a horrible start, caught up, and then gave a few runs back to what will probably be the best offense in baseball. Oh well.
Am I concerned? Obviously. But I'm more concerned with the fact that Beckett and Buchholz, two guys we really need something like 400 ip out of this year, are not performing no better than I would if you tossed me out for BP. If you ask me that's a far bigger concern than who's going to pitch the last inning of close victories...because I'd wager that number of innings is going to come in a lot smaller than the 400 ip number I'm looking at for our alleged 2nd and 3rd starters.
PS: All that said, I'm right there with the rest of you nutjobs, this next game is an absolute must win for the sox season. The sox go 0-4 and I'm calling into the sports radio shows calling for heads. There's only so much patience a man's got.
