Fenway Forum

Glad to hear Mike Lowell will be back with the Sox for the 2008 season - agreeing to a 3 year, $37.5Million deal.

Not that I think we’ll ever know for sure but I’m curious how many deals there really were for Lowell.  The Phillies came out and said they weren’t interested after rumors were floating around that they had made an offer.  The Yankees were supposedly interested for Lowell at first base after they signed A-Rod but claim to have never officially made an offer.  Now I read there may not have been any team willing to sign for 4 years.  It doesn’t really matter - the Sox got a great 3rd baseman who the team and fans love.  Now the Red Sox just need to work on the relief pitching and the team should be in great shape for next season.

I just read that along with talking to A-Rod about coming back to the Yankees the team would also be interested in Mike Lowell for 1st base. Thats news to me - I wonder how Lowell would react? He plays 3rd very well and its where he has been for a while but 1st would be easier which would make 4 years easier to see happening. Plus - the Yankees could keep him from the Red Sox. Should be interesting to see how A-Rod’s new found interest in the Yankees plays into the Lowell situation.

Dustin Pedroia has just been officially announced the AL Rookie of the Year.  Pedroia getting the award won’t be much of a surprise to many Red Sox fans who have known he was going to win for months.

MLB.com: Pedroia a Cut Above the Rest

I’m glad to hear Curt Schilling will be back in a Red Sox uniform in 2008 and from what I hear and read Curt and the Sox are both happy with the deal.  Long term I hope Schilling will stick around after the season in some capacity with the team.

The only pressing issue for the Sox now is third base - reports are that Theo is working on a deal with Mike Lowell and his agent.  I belive they have until Monday (Nov 12) to negotiate one-on-one - after that other teams can talk money.  I think the biggest sticking point as got to be length of contract - the Red Sox will probably offer 2-3 years and I’m sure some other team will offer more, maybe 4-5.  I’m not sure Lowell will take a discount to play in Boston - it seems like he enjoys playing for the team but he seems like the kind of guy who could get along well anywhere - which may be good for him and bad for the Red Sox.

Everyone knows the Red Sox won the World Series and they did so pretty easily - 4 game sweep.  I take this as conclusive evidence the Sox are the better team - well the owner of the Rockies doesn’t agree -

“These guys did amazing things,” Monfort said. “I think this team is a better team than Boston. It would have been nice to have another two, three, four days. We’ll wake up tomorrow and go, ‘There’s no baseball game to go to,’ but what a deal they did. It’s an amazing thing they accomplished just to get here.”

What?  Did this guy watch the same games?  The 4 games where the Red Sox outscored the Rockies 29-10?  Come on - get real.  (You can read more comments here at the Denver Post)  I think the ownership of the Rockies has been drinking too much of the “this is our destiny” kool-aid.

I think this articles title from ESPN sums up the game last night - Who’s Hot? Everyone in a Red Sox uniform.

The Red Sox were unbelievable last night - a lot of people are saying the Rockies are rusty - how about the Red Sox are just that good.  I’m hoping Ubaldo Jimenez watched every pitch last night and had nightmares about the Sox offense.  I think the lack of experience pitching in the majors especially against an American League team and doing so on a stage like the World Series will be too much for the Rockies rookie.

Dice-K came up big holding the Indians to just 2 runs over 5 innings.  The bullpen also looked great pitching 4 shutout innings to close the season on the Indians.

Josh Beckett won the ALCS MVP which I think most people will agree with now he needs to get the Cy Young to cap off an unbelievable season.

With the 11-2 score the game was much closer than final score would have most people believe - up until the 8th I thought the Indians were still very much in the game.  Overall the ALCS was some great baseball - finally some worth watching.  With the Indians beating the Yankees in 4 and the rest of the division playoffs being sweeps there wasn’t much suspense in the playoffs until this series.  Both teams with the same record in the regular season meeting up for a chance to go to the World Series and the series going the full 7 games made for exciting baseball.  I’m just happy my team won.  The Indians are definetly a good team and I’m sure we’ll here more about them in the future - the biggest surprise to me is what the team has done with such a small payroll.  The Indians are in the mid $60 million range vs. the Yankees with there $200+ million and the Red Sox not far behind the Yankees - Cleveland has certainly proved they can play and those in charge of the teams player development have a lot to be proud of.

That being said - the Sox have there work cut out for the them in the World Series - Colorado is playing at an unbelievable level right now.  I hope the 10+ days off in between series’ will have cooled them down some.  We’ll find out soon enough.

Josh Beckett came through again last night - shutting down the Indians in a must win game to move the series back to Fenway.  Beckett improved to 3-0 this October with an ERA of 1.17 - can you say Cy Young?

To me it looked like Beckett had most of the Indians beat before they even stepped into the batters box - I’m sure it was the last pitcher they wanted to see.  Word is he may be able to pitch some relief innings in game 7.  Dice-K will get the start but I’m hoping he’ll be on a short leash - at the first sign of any shakiness get someone else in there - and why not Beckett?  With a couple of days rest he may not be able to pitch a full game but why not 2, 3, or 4 relief innings? 

An interesting note from the game was the singer chosen to sing the national anthem during the game - turns out she is one of Josh Becketts ex-girlfriends.  The Indians claim this was simply a coincidence - sure - to bad it didn’t help.  What can the Sox do to welcome the Indians and Fausto Carmona to Fenway on Saturday?

Dice-K struggled for 4 2/3 innings pitching 101 pitches and giving up 4 runs - while Jake Westbrook looked like an all-star - holding the Sox to 2 runs in 6 2/3.  Dice-K just hasn’t had the same stuff he had in the first half of the season.  I don’t know if its the workload of a longer season and a shorter rotation or if he’s simply not an unknown to hitters anymore.  As for Westbrook the Red Sox have had success against him in the past but couldn’t get anything going - 20 of Westbrook’s outs came from ground balls.  The sinkerball was able to render the Sox lineup ineffective. 

Wakefield goes tonight for the Red Sox and nobody knows how he is going to perform - having not pitched since September 29.  Paul Byrd will be pitching for the Indians.  Byrd pitched fairly well in his last outing against the Yankees getting the win by going 5 innings and giving up 2 runs.  Against New York he did give up 8 hits but the Yankees were unable to get many home.

Depending on which Red Sox lineup shows up - Boston has a good chance to win this game. 

…to the pitchers duel that wasn’t?  The performance from Fausto Carmona and Curt Schilling just didn’t live up to hype.  Fausto was gone from the game much earlier than I thought he would thanks to patient hitting from the Sox and Schilling just didn’t look as dominant as he did in his last game.

Was Gagne the only choice in the 11th?   Maybe he - was looking at the list of pitchers used there were few options - I just don’t know how he can be trusted at this point when the game is on the line.