Red Sox vs. Royals lineup: Calmer than you are

Yesterday, before the Red Sox lost 4-2 to the Royals, knocking Boston out of first place, a defiant Dustin Pedroia stood in the locker room and did some damage control for the DL-bound David Price. He was sort of a dick about it. So, too, were the apparently overwhelming number of fans — mostly invisible to me without cherrypicking Twitter, for what it’s worth — theorizing that Price was making up the injury to avoid playing for a team he hates. They were really dicks. Then there were the fed-up bloggers types, and they are my people. Sick of the nonsense to which I am not privy, my editors past and present and even Chad Finn (Chad, no!!) have declaratively stated that Price is hurt (or basically so, in Finn’s case. And certainly, other people have said this, too, but I don’t care about their opinions. We hurt the ones we love! And Collins!).

Anyhow this — what they’re doing — is neither inherently dickish nor necessarily so here, but it is also an impossible statement to make for certain, even in exasperation. Which is to say I’m the "ACTUALLY,,," dick, even in that crowd, and I’ll lean into, because someone’s gotta, or something. The cycle has to end somewhere. We don’t want to simply stop the wheel, after all. So, ACTUALLY, we should calm down and watch the Red Sox (56-48) play the Royals (infinity straight wins) tonight at Fenway Park (7:10 p.m., television) behind Eduardo Rodriguez. It’s a summer Saturday at Fenway, and it is no time to be un-dude. Break the wheel, break out the beer and crack open your papers. Weekend nights at home are a throwback treat, and it’s time to relax. It’s baseball; anything can happen, like scoring runs, even, maybe. Dare to dream! Here are the full lineups: