/cdn.vox-cdn.com/photo_images/6751611/20120502_ajw_aa6_148.jpg)
The big news in baseball, and yes, it does affect the Red Sox, is Mariano Rivera's torn ACL. He suffered it while shagging fly balls in batting practice before yesterday's game at Kansas City of all places. More on that here at OTM later today. (Rivera Tears ACL; Baseball Nation) (Video of the injury at The Score)
Dave Cameron thinks it's a "significant blow" to the Yankees. (Dave Cameron; Fan Graphs)
Hardball Talk has a rundown of Rivera's post-injury press conference. He could be done. Like done-done. (D.J. Short; Hardball Talk)
Somewhat surprisingly, Clayton Mortensen was pretty good. (Brian MacPherson; The Providence Journal)
Adrian Gonzalez has been pretty lousy, but he knows it and is working hard to fix the problem. (Mike Petraglia; WEEI.com)
Jerry Remy is going to miss another week which means Dennis Eckersley will take over the majority of Red Sox games in his absence. (Peter Abraham; The Boston Globe) That gives me the opportunity to pull this out of mothballs. Unfortunately the videos have been taken down (thanks MLBAM!) but the transcripts do a fine job of getting the point across. (Matt Kory; Toooast!!!)
The Bobby Valentine Era has been marked by a sometimes excessively slow hook. (Chip Buck; Fire Brand of the AL)
This "simple system" maybe doesn't do the best job of evaluating catcher defense, which is good because Jarrod Saltalamacchia is pretty darn far down the list. (Matt Klaassen; The Score)
Daniel Bard's last start was a bit strange and he has no idea why. (Brian MacPherson; The Providence Journal)
Things I learned in April: The Red Sox bullpen is a mess. (Matt Kory; Baseball Prospectus [free!])
Finally, fun with anagrams! (Joy of Sox)