Turning the Corner

by drabidea on Aug 7, 2008 10:15 AM EDT

Have the Red Sox turned the Corner to finish of the Regular Season hot and hopefully carry into the playoffs? Only time can tell but there numbers lately have been quite encouraging. You can attribute it to all sorts of things (Manny Leaving, Ortiz is Back, The Bullpen is getting better).

Bullpen: One of the greatest surprises and moment of encouragement has been the bullpen lately. Over the last 7 days of 18 innings of relief pitching we have given up 1 measly run, which wasn't even earned. Over the last 30 days of 65 innings of relief pitching we have given up 15 runs. That is an ERA of 2.08. They have honestly saved us as of late with our diminutive offense.

Bay: Since he has been a Red Sox: .423/.500/.692 Obviously these numbers won't keep this sultry pace, however, I think he has layed to bed the idea he wouldn't be able to hit with the Boston pressure.

Ellsbury: Still too early to tell but over the last 7 days .353/.353/.529 He still needs to get back to taking Walks but still encouraging.

You can name the recent success on a variety of things, but will it last?

Poll

How will the rest of the Red Sox season turn out?

Keep up torrid pace for the rest of the season and through out the playoffs

7 votes

Good enough to get us into the playoffs but will fall in the playoffs

5 votes

Just a fluke, we won't even make it into the playoffs

4 votes

16 votes | Poll has closed

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Comments

For what it's worth!

I posted this elsewhere, but it fits well here!

Other than the chronic offensive weakness at catcher, which WILL have to be dealt with by the eventual removal of Varitek IMO, I thought the line up for Tuesday night’s game was about the best I have seen or could imagine for the sox. Exciting and strong to say the least.

Even if they leave Varitek in for now, this line-up can repeat as champions. I stress that Crisp and Lugo MUST be kept off the field as they just don’t have even the potential to allow momentum to gather and extend. They are truly momentum suckers of the first degree. Ellsburg and Lowrie and Bay can infuse and foster momentum as they did on Tuesday. If you keep Crisp and Lugo out of the lineup, that just leaves Varitek as the sole primary momentum sucker, and although not ideal, one momentum sucker can be likely tolerated for a while!!

by NG on Aug 7, 2008 12:02 PM EDT reply actions

Sorry to steal your post

by drabidea on Aug 7, 2008 1:57 PM EDT up reply actions

Lineup

Speaking of the lineup, I think I would assemble it differently sans Manny. Shouldn’t Ortiz be hitting clean-up now? Here’s how I see it:

1. Pedroia, 2B
2. Drew, RF
3. Youk, 1B
4. Ortiz, DH
5. Bay, LF
6. Lowell, 3B
7. Lowrie, SS
8. Veritek, C
9. Ellsbury, CF

Until Jacoby is comfortable at the plate again, he should bat ninth- that way he’s like a semi-leadoff hitter who can set the table of the top of the order if he gets on base. (And he can do this better than Tek.) So I have Pedroia leading off and the others just fall into place after that. Bay is a better hitter than Lowell and should bat ahead of him.

by Schulz on Aug 10, 2008 9:47 AM EDT up reply actions

Pedroia the Destroya

DP is awesome and one of my favorite players, but he is not really a leadoff hitter. He only has a .361 OBP. I am not trying to dimenish that number, because it is pretty damn good, but not that good for a leadoff hitter. He is nearly perfection of a number two hitter. He constantly puts the bat on the ball and will move players along the bases.

I think Ells has worked out of his slump and should be put back in the leadoff position. If he slumps again I would put Drew in as leadoff. He is just better suited for the leadoff position.

My Lineup:
Ells, Ped, Drew, Youk, Ortiz, Bay, Lowell, Lowrie, Tek

This is until Ortiz is out of his slump. Then switch him and Drew. With Bay’s recent success he will still give Ortiz enough protection. With Ped, Drew, and Youk in a row you are pretty much guaranteed runs.

by drabidea on Aug 11, 2008 3:03 PM EDT up reply actions

You know

The bullpen looks a lot better, and a lot more reliable since Hansen got traded. I don’t know, maybe he sucked a whole fucking lot of momentum. :)

It's the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day.

by MerryGoByeBye on Aug 7, 2008 4:13 PM EDT reply actions

I don't believe in momentum sucking

The Sox are playing well and will continue to play well because they have a favorable schedule.

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 7, 2008 7:36 PM EDT reply actions

I was kidding about Hansen

I don’t believe in momentum sucking as well. But the Sox always had sort of trouble in KC, and the Sox are also not having a good season on the road. So taking 2 out 3 there for me is more than favorable schedule. We’re leaving less guys on base and the bullpen is not giving runs, so maybe we are seeing an improvement.

It's the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day.

by MerryGoByeBye on Aug 7, 2008 9:52 PM EDT up reply actions

They swept Seattle too

The Sox have had trouble there. After that, they lost two of three to the MFY and were swept by the Angels in back-to-back home series.

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 7, 2008 10:39 PM EDT up reply actions

They lost 2 to the MFY

Sure, but Manny didn’t play in those games. I guess you remember what he did. We rocked Ponson, but, hey, Ponson sucks. Then the Sox played some of the worst baseball I’ve ever seen from them against the Angels, and got swept. If you say that the Sox played just as good against both the Royals and the A’s as they did against the Angels, you didn’t watch the same games I did. Sure, the Royals and the A’s are weak, but I saw some improvement from the series against the Angels. Not in the ‘turning the corner’ way, but things seemed a lot better.

Maybe I’m wrong, and we’ll see against the ChiSox.

It's the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day.

by MerryGoByeBye on Aug 7, 2008 11:43 PM EDT up reply actions

Manny played in 2 of 3 games v. the MFY

Look, it was good to see Ellsbury hit well in back-to-back games. But neither games was against a good starter. I’ll start changing my opinion od Taco Bay when I see him drive the inside pitches most teams have been gettting him out on for most of the season.

I like Lowrie. He has been impressive lately, and seems an upgrade at the plate over Lugo or Cora. He hit .348 AVG/.407 OBP/.607 SLG in the 6 games v. Oakland and KC. However, in 2 recent series v. the Angels and 1 v. the MFY he hit: .200 AVG/.348 OBP/.300 SLG.

Things do seem better. But they often do when you take care of business against teams that you are supposed to beat. The MFY looked like world beaters a few weeks ago, when they were playing soft teams.

I expect the Sox to win the division. I think they’ll do so mostly because they have the best remaining schedule.

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 8, 2008 7:26 AM EDT up reply actions

You're right, Manny did play in 2 of 3 against the Yanks

I forgot about that, I thought he sit the first 2 games. My point was that in the series against the Angels, the Sox played so poorly that everything after that would most likely be an improvement. I agree with you that we have a somewhat easy schedule up to the end of the season, but the team just seemed better against the Royals. Not better than what they were on the beginning of the season, but better than they were against the Angels. That was a fucking painful series.

And the Sox beated the Royals and the A’s basically without Manny, Papi and Lowell. So when the last 2 of these guys come back to life, this team most likely will be scary good again.

It's the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day.

by MerryGoByeBye on Aug 8, 2008 10:12 AM EDT up reply actions

Uhhh... I beg to differ

http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/news/wrap.jsp?ymd=20080702&content_id=3050801&vkey=wrapup2005&fext=.jsp&team=away&c_id=bos
Scroll down to the pitchers

by bdalebs on Aug 8, 2008 10:13 AM EDT up reply actions

I remember this game

It was painful, but it’s something that does not happen very often.

It's the same old story. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy forgets girl, boy remembers girl, girls dies in a tragic blimp accident over the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day.

by MerryGoByeBye on Aug 8, 2008 10:19 AM EDT up reply actions

Do you believe in momentum for a sports team?

I you don’t, then you have never played organized sports. If you do, then you must realize how fragile such momentum can be, and when not just one but 3 players are subpar offensively, that kills most sparks!

by NG on Aug 7, 2008 9:53 PM EDT up reply actions

I have played organized sports

Sure, the bottom of the order has hurt them at times this year. But to blame a couple of players for every Sox loss is stupid. And to say that Boston can’t win with this or that player-when they won with them last year-is crazy.

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 7, 2008 10:49 PM EDT up reply actions

+1.

by 0157H7 on Aug 7, 2008 11:02 PM EDT up reply actions

Last year was a bit lucky!

The past does not guide the future; otherwise, the Babe Ruth Yankees would still be the champions.

Last year the sox almost blew a huge lead, and one could say that early lead was what gave them their playoff place. Once in the playoff, well that was an example of what momentum can do!

Talking of the Sox past, remember 2006? The cause of that kind of collapse is what management must diagnose and prevent, and luckily for some of us, management seems to be listening to me and not you!

by NG on Aug 8, 2008 7:44 AM EDT up reply actions

The collapse in 2006 was almost entirely due to injuries.

We were snakebitten to a historic degree. What can you, I, the front office or the man in the moon do to prevent such a string of terrible misfortunes?

Anyway, to talk about almost blowing the AL East lead last year misses an obvious point. You will always have hot streaks and cold streaks over the course of a season. Last year, we started like an express train. In 2004, we finished like one. It doesn’t matter which way round you do it.

And finally, we didn’t exactly have momentum in the ALCS against the Indians last year. We were three-one down.

"no1 has time to read your long comments, are you writing a book?"

by britsoxfan on Aug 8, 2008 8:10 AM EDT up reply actions

I agree

I’m going to use a basketball analogy here to try to show that momentum really isn’t that important for a team. A couple of years ago, the Denver Nuggets racked up something like 32-6 or something crazy like that coming into the playoffs. They were clearly the “hottest team”, but they were still an 8 seed playing the 1 seed, which was the T-Wolves that year. Tons of analysts picked the Nuggets to win because they had all that momentum that would propel them to pull off a historic upset. What did they do though? Lost in 5 games. Clearly momentum didn’t help the Nuggets.

by aspeninthewindow on Aug 8, 2008 12:02 PM EDT up reply actions

And the Patriots, of course

"no1 has time to read your long comments, are you writing a book?"

by britsoxfan on Aug 8, 2008 2:32 PM EDT up reply actions

Last year was a bit lucky?

Last year the Sox were tied for the best record in the AL at 96-66. They’re Pythagorean W-L record was 101-61. So, if anything, they were unlucky last year.

What’s most interesting is that no one was talking about the past. That’s a non-sequitur given the discussion on this thread. One piece of advice: if you are going to build your argument around a straw man, try to get it right.

Also, Brit is 100% right about 2006.

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 8, 2008 6:15 PM EDT up reply actions

**

their Pythagorean W-L ...

I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.

by Drugs Delaney on Aug 8, 2008 6:51 PM EDT up reply actions

Adam Dunn

red sox should of got a slugger like adam dunn instead of Bay, why wouldnt they plus he’s younger than Bay, his BA might not be as good as manny or bay but he has over 30 hrs. Crock of shit for what the red sox had to get rid of for getting bay

by BostonNation on Aug 11, 2008 9:13 PM EDT reply actions