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Red Sox lint in the playoff cranial vent
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- Sox starters must throw it in reverse. The Boston Red Sox will send Jon Lester, Josh Beckett, Clay Buchholz, and Daisuke Matsuzaka out to pitch against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in the upcoming AL Division Series, and some recent trends will have to be reversed for the club to move on. For instance, Beckett and Buchholz will have to put an end to their recent penchant for surrendering homers, and Dice-K will have to surrender fewer baserunners than is his usual practice. As for Lester, well, as long as he dodges incoming line drives, he should be OK!
- Swan song for Varitek? Painful as it may be to contemplate, this easily could be team captain Jason Varitek's last games in a Red Sox uniform. He's a superior baseball intellect, but his physical skills are not what they were and his offensive numbers, for far less money, can be easily duplicated by dozens of faceless others. About the best that can be said about his hitting this year is that he did keep his average above .200 (.209, to be precise), and defensively, he did throw out 16 of the 124 baserunners who attempted to steal. (Forget that this responsibility is shared with the pitchers, for the exceedingly low success rate still makes the point.) Regardless of what happens in the ALDS – which he's more likely to see from the dugout than from the field – it says here that the Sox won't exercise their option to bring him back, and his pride may keep him from exercising his.
- Manny who? Poor Manny Delcarmen. The local kid made good pitched poorly at season's end (14.4 ERA in September), got mildly banged up in a fender-bender on his way to work (back, neck), and lost his roster spot for the first round of the playoffs. Delcarmen is like many young talents in that he has great stuff but a transient ability to command. Two years ago, he posted an ERA of 2.05 in 44 games, but this figure climbed to 3.27 in 2008 and 4.53 in '09. A steady upward trend in ERA for a reliever is not a good thing, no matter how overpowering he can be. So the Red Sox will carry Paul Byrd in the bullpen instead, replacing 'stuff' with experience, and no doubt hoping against hope he won't be needed.
- Past results do not guarantee future performance. These words may not have registered when you read them on your 401(k) enrollment form, but they are worth heeding here in the playoffs. The fact that the Angels have won but a single post-season game against the Red Sox since 1986 is wholly irrelevant, and this year's edition may be the most dangerous yet. They pitch, they run, and they field, and they're emotionally committed to win it all in memory of their fallen phenom, Nick Adenhart.
- Prediction: Sox in 4 if neither Buchholz nor, especially, Matsuzaka self-destruct. Otherwise, Angels in 5.
- PS: Anybody else notice how little we've heard about Manny Ramirez since he served his 50-game suspension for testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs? He played in 104 games, hit 19 home runs, drove in 63, and batted .290. But he became visible in this household only when he told Dodger Stadium fans they are the best fans in the world. Guess we lost our hold on first place in his heart, huh!
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