After that, early fall is my favorite time of year. Baseball is coming down the home-stretch, the NFL season is getting through its first quarter, and the Bruins and (usually) Celtics are getting geared up for their camps and upcoming seasons. So here we are, the 3rd week of September, and we Boston sports fans are in the thick of it... and this season the emotions run the full spectrum: fevered excitement, tense anxiety, all-too-familiar anguish, and renewed celebration. So with that, I'm kicking off the first in a series of regular features here on TitleHub: the State of the Nation, where I'll break down in abridged (for me) fashion the current issues and insights on the four major Boston franchises.
Red Sox:
I won't over-state the obvious: The Sox are in major trouble. Any of you not living under a rock are already pretty well aware of it. And anytime a team collapses like this, the first thing most people will do is rush to find blame. I, of course, am no different than most people... so naturally I have spent a great deal of my time lately trying to assess where the blame lies... but unlike most people, I try to do so in a fair and balanced manner, taking all aspects of the situation into account before rushing to judgment. Obviously the biggest problem on this team lies with pitching. Due to injuries and failure to reach expectations, what we have isn't remotely close to good enough. Some are finding fault with Terry Francona's management of this situation. They feel he's been too patient with abject failures like John Lackey, or too loyal to ineffective guys like Tim Wakefield. Or too reliant on bullpen stalwarts like Daniel Bard, ultimately to his detriment... and to a point they are right. Lackey should not be starting games for this team any more. And neither should Wakefield. They both give up too many runs, and what's worse, they give them up almost immediately, putting enormous pressure on a fairly injured and inconsistent lineup to either come from behind or jump out to a big lead every night. This causes the offensive players to press... and it's good for no-one when that happens. Frankly it looks to me like Bard needs about 2 weeks off. He's clearly gassed rigt now and his confidence is shaken. A wise Francona would have "found" a strained forearm or something to land Bard on the 15 day DL and just let him rest and recompose... instead he's being thrown out there time after time again and again in pressure situations, and the results have been obvious. Francona is managing like a desperate, drowning man and I think it's cost him a couple of games, frankly... but then again... I'm not sure what else I'd like him to have done, in hindsight. The fact is that he has to get this team into the playoffs. Just has to... with this payroll and these expectations, not getting there is going to be seen as an utter failure and it's going to be an interesting off-season if it happens. So he has to take his best shot to win every game, every night. And the other fact is that injuries have forced him into using what he has... because frankly he HAS to. I hate seeing Wakefield and Lackey take the mound... I know it's going to mean spotting the opponents 4-6 runs... be they the Yankees or the Mariners... but then again, I'm not sure what the other options are. Wieland isn't ready. And frankly I'm not sure he will be anytime soon. Bucholz is coming back but at best he'll be a long reliever in the playoffs... he just hasn't been stretched out enough to start, and there isn't enough time to get there. Dice-K is on IR, and was a nightmare when he was healthy. Some are calling for Alfredo Aceves to make a couple of starts down the stretch... and I'd mainly agree except that at this point doing so would throw an already shaky bullpen into further chaos. At this point you NEED Aceves in the bullpen because he's the guy they call on to stop the bleeding in the 5th, 6th and 7th innings every 3 or 4 days when one of these other stiffs is getting whacked around. With Aceves, you can bring him in after Lackey is done giving up 5 runs on 9 hits in 4 1/3 innings and let him settle things down so the offense can have some hope of catching up. It doesn't always work and the offense has shown a lack of ability to come from behind when it needs to lately, but still, if you throw Morales or Albers or Dubront out there you run a real chance of letting the game get completely out of hand. I think Aceves would be a great option for a starter, but he's far too valuable in the 'pen to try that move right now. Terry Francona has made some questionable moves lately, but again, I give him some leeway here because to a degree his hands are tied... he has to make due with what he has.
Others will put the blame on Theo Epstein for over-paying for Crawford (who by the way still has that "deer-in-the-headlights-i'm-in-over-my-head-here look... which is simply not acceptable at this point in the season) and not focusing enough attention on building solid bullpen depth and viable starting pitchers in the minor-league conduit... and again, to a degree they're right. He did over-pay for Crawford. By a lot. Even if Crawford was putting up .300 / 25 / 100 numbers he'd have overpaid... but I don't blame him for that. Like it or not, complaining about overpaying is for fans of teams without the revenue stream of a Red Sox or Yankees team. We have one of the highest revenue-generating teams in all of MLB. We can afford to overpay. And given that we can afford to overpay, I think the bulk of you fans who bitch about overpaying, would be more pissed if the Sox didn't overpay for talent when the clearly could, if it meant making the team a perennial contender. So I'm done listening to the bitching about that. The Sox can overpay, and so occasionally it's incumbent upon them that they do. That's the reality of baseball in 2011. Deal with it. The Crawford move was a good one at the time... he was the best player available at the time, and played a position of need (outfield)... and signing him also kept him out of the hands of rival teams like the Angels and Yankees. It was worth the risk. Where they flubbed it was in over-reacting to his slow start, letting the media sway their handling of him (I believe this), and shuttling him all over the lineup for the bulk of the season, undermining his confidence and never letting him get comfortable with his offensive role. They should have slotted him in the number 2 slot, let Pedroia hit 3rd, Gonzales 4th, Youk / Ortiz 5th / 6th depending on the matchup, and left it there... let him work out his issues at least knowing what his spot and role in the lineup was. The way Francona and the Sox handled him for most of the season, I think, was a horrible mistake.
That said, I think that despite his woes this season, the signing of Crawford was meant as a long term investment, and those who are calling for him to be traded are frankly deluded. Only a fool would buy high and sell low so soon after making an investment... and Theo is anything but a fool. Crawford is here for the next couple of years at least, and I think will prove to have been worth the investment eventually.
As far as the bullpen and developmental pitching issues... well, I'm split on this. I think coming in to the season Theo did a pretty good job of building the bullpen... signing Aceves was a stroke of genius, and Albers was a great pickup. Jenks was an abject failure, but was a low risk move to begin with. For 75% of the season this was one of the better bullpens in baseball... it's only fallen apart now because the starting pitching has been so poor they are getting overworked. It's the starting pitching where I have to give Theo a failing grade... both on the major-league roster and at the minor-league level. Coming in to this season we had one bona-fide ace in Lester, one young pitcher who looked to be making "the leap" in Bucholz, one former great who hadn't been anything approaching his former self in years, two overpaid, back of the rotation clunkers in Lackey and Dice-K, and one over-the-hill knuckleballer without a clear role. That's a lot of uncertainty for the starting rotation on a team with world-series aspirations. At the very least Theo should have brought in a solid no. 3 starter... and frankly I think they could have had Cliff Lee for the money they paid Crawford... I'd take that deal in a minute. And what's worse, the only thing the Sox had approaching a blue-chip pitching prospect was shipped away in the Gonzalez trade. Don't get me wrong... having seen Gonzalez now for a full season, I'd make that trade again tomorrow and throw in Bucholz if they asked for him... but the problem is that the minor league system is conspicuously devoid of viable major-league starting pitching prospects. This falls at the feet of Theo Epstein. I've long been and will continue to be an ardent Epstein supporter, but I think he dropped the ball on this one, and as a result we're now pinning our hopes on Erik Bedard rounding into some form of decent no. 3 starter in enough time to rescue the season and have any hopes of doing anything in the post-season.... and that's just a scary thought.
That said, I think ultimately the Sox will get in to the playoffs. Had the Rays not drawn the red hot Yankees this week, I think they might have had a shot... but they aren't going to take more than 1 game against the Yanks... and I think Lester and Beckett will win their starts, and the Sox will carry a 4 or 5 game lead into the final week of the season. That should be enough. And once there, if Bedard can round into a decent no. 3, and Bucholz gets healthy enough to throw 3 or 4 innings in critical situations, I think people will start to feel like they might have written off the Sox a bit too early. Color me still fairly optimistic... or blindly stupid... whatever.
(Yikes... that was not abridged at all... sorry).
Patriots:
We're two weeks into the Patriots 2011 season and so far we've learned that Tom Brady might be just now reaching the top of his game... and that's downright friggin scary. We've learned that Bill Belichick can still coach better than anyone in the game (duh). We've learned that the defense is a work in progress... it's not nearly as good as it's going to be in a few weeks, and not nearly as bad as some of the numbers might suggest. We've learned that the Boston media, and the national media at large, seem to be stumbling over themselves to manufacture stories surrounding the two newest, and most mercurial, members of the Patriots: Chad Ochocinco and Albert Haynesworth... shame on you, media. SHAME. At worst, these two guys are showing up, working hard, contributing (occasionally at a high level) and generally doing everything asked of them. Would that all 32 teams had more players like that. Leave them the hell alone already, till they actually do something worthy of controversy. Cripes sake.
Man... I know it's only 2 games in... and I know it's a long season... but watching those two games, against two good to very good defenses, it was like watching 1s against 3s in the pre-season. It's not even fair, and that's not supposed to happen in the NFL.
This defense is going to be better than the one on the field in 2007, and I think the offense is more diverse and less predictable than the 2007 version. As scary as it sounds... this team might end up being better than that 2007 team. And frankly I can not wait to see if I'm right about that.
In more relevant news from the past week, the Pats ultimately put Dan Koppen on IR today, effectively ending his season. Based on the initial diagnosis, it seems like they didn't have to make that move. But I think watching Dan Connolly ably man the center position over the past game an a half, they decided that the safer play for Koppen, long term, was to let him rehab his ankle at an easy pace, and not rush him back to play in the last 2 or 3 games, and risk more significant injury. Offensive line play is all about repetition and continuity, and the Pats will be hard pressed to try and get that back with Koppen in time to be effective this season. I think it's probably the right move at this point.
The Pats also put Myron Pryor on IR, which is a shame... Pryor looked pretty good in the action he saw this season, and I think had a chance to be a big contributor. This just puts added pressure on the D-Line depth, but as is so often the case with the Patriots, depth is something they definitely have on the D-Line... and not just depth... quality depth. So few teams have the luxury of saying that.
Bruins:
Tomorrow night the Stanley Cup Champion Boston Bruins (yup... I will not tire of writing that for at least another 6 months) take the ice for their first pre-season game in preparation of defending the Cup this season. The champs are back on the ice, and the feelings of excitement and jubilation that had somewhat subsided over the summer are beginning to make their way back to the ice-surface. The Bruins return their championship club largely intact. They lose inconsistent winger Michael Ryder and underperforming defenseman Tomas Kaberle, but bring in hard-shooting veteran defenseman Joe Corvo to pair with Zdeno Chara into one of the most fearsome hard-shooting power-play point tandems in hockey. None of these moves should have any major impact on the Bruins, who will essentially allow 2nd year wunderkind Tyler Seguin to possibly take over Ryder's spot on the second or third line. I also expect Jordan Caron to take the next step to being a regular contributor.
Of course the Bruins will continue to have the NHLs best goalie, Tim Thomas, back between the pipes, with perhaps one of the best backups in hockey (Tuuka Rask) ready if called upon. There's not a reason in the world Bruins fans shouldn't expect this team to be one of the elite teams from start to finish, and have a real shot at being the first team to successfully defend the cup since the '98 Red Wings. I'm so excited I might wet myself. Seriously... I'm leaking a little... need to go... be right back...
Celtics:
I'm not inclined to write anything about the Celtics or the NBA in general until someone on either side starts acting like a grownup. And since that doesn't look like it's going to happen, this will be a short bit...
The NBA lockout is just like the NFL lockout was... only absent people who actually give a shit about fixing it. See all you NBA fans next September, when the NBA realizes that the NFL is the only sport that can actually survive a prolonged lockout without serious repercussions... (maybe they should talk to the NHL or MLB about that).
No comments:
Post a Comment