No surgery for the Laser Show

I'm just going to take this time to note how ecstatic I am that Dustin Pedroia, by all accounts, will not need surgery on his troublesome right knee.  According to boston.com's Extra Bases blog, Pedey has suffered nothing more serious than a bruised kneecap, and will be reunited with the Red Sox tomorrow.

Terry Francona noted that while Pedroia does have some cartilage damage, most baseball players do - including the skipper himself.  What is far more worrisome to me is that it was bothering Pedroia enough not only for him to mention it, but enough for him to ask for time off to get it checked out.

It's obviously been affecting his performance, as his line this year is less than stellar.  With damage that required surgery, we could have seen a repaired and rejuvenated Dustin in about a month.  As things stand now, we don't know how things stand.  It's obvious that Pedey is the sparkplug and heart and soul of the Red Sox.  It's also clear (to me, at least) that they could survive a month without him to get him back full steam for the remainder of the season.

If there's no simple surgical solution for what ails the feisty second baseman, what can we expect as the season continues?  That's the big mystery, and since Pedroia himself has admitted his poor performance is due to the pain in his knee and his surgically repaired foot than to any sort of regular slump.

Hopefully he doesn't go the Nomar route: I simply cannot watch another promising, talented, homegrown player go through a string of injuries and DL-stints.  Luckily, I absolutely cannot imagine Pedroia sulking, refusing to play, or demanding a trade.  Keep your fingers crossed he heals up soon... I've been missing the Laser Show.

FAQ: The First Year Player Draft

Since there was no Red Sox game last night, I decided to watch the first round of the MLB First Year Player Draft on MLBNetwork until the Bruins played.  My mom, a casual fan, was watching with me, and had a lot of questions about the process.  If she had questions, I'm willing to bet some of YOU have questions as well:

• How do they decide who picks first?
• Generally, the teams pick in reverse order of the final standings from the previous year.

• But they didn''t pick in exact reverse order - what's up with that?
• Here's where it gets a little more complicated.  When teams sign top-ranked free agents, they have to sacrifice some of their draft picks.  Elias Sports Bureau ranks players by position every year, and the top 20 percent are considered Type A, while the players lower than 20% but in the top 40% are Type B.  Teams signing Type A free agents must surrender their first round draft pick to the team the FA is leaving, and that team will also receive a pick in the supplemental first round.  Teams that lose a Type B free agent only get a supplemental pick.

• That's a little confusing; can you explain it in terms of the Red Sox?
• Sure!  This year, the Red Sox had to give up their own first round pick to the Tampa Bay Rays, because they signed Type A free agent Carl Crawford.  However, they received first round picks from the Detroit Tigers for Type A free agent Victor Martinez, and from the Texas Rangers for Type A free agent Adrian Beltre.

• Who gets drafted?
• The pool of players for the MLB draft is quite large.  Players must be from the US or Canada, and must be high school graduates.  Any high school graduate who has NOT attended college, players attending a four-year college who have finished their junior or senior years, and any player attending a community or junior college is eligible to be drafted by any team.

• How many rounds are there?
• As many as 50.  A club can choose to "pass" it's pick at any point, after which they may make no more selections in that year's draft.

• Why so many rounds? The NBA only has two!
• Unlike the other major sports in the US, baseball draft picks are almost never expected to make a major impact at the major league level right away.  There are 4 levels of minor leagues that players can progress through, and each of those levels must be able to field a full team.  Thus, players taken in the later rounds are almost never expected to make it to the majors, but are essentially used to fill the rosters of the minor leagues.  Of course, now and then a pick from the lower rounds will surprise everyone.

• Do most players take high school players? College players? Junior college players?
• I'm sure many of you are familiar with the bestselling book Moneyball, which made the argument that college players are nearly always the better investment, since they play against a known level of competition, and so their stats might actually mean something.  However, teams often pick high school phenoms, with the understanding that it will take a large signing bonus to lure them away from the college they might have committed to.

That's all my mom asked me, but I'm happy to answer anything else you guys might want to know.  Leave any further questions in the comments section!

さようなら, Daisuke

Despite the fact that we are still waiting on an official club announcement, the murmurs are growing louder, and Tommy John surgery seems to be in the cards for Daisuke Matsuzaka.  Maybe it had to end this way: a surgical procedure with an excruciating recovery period for a pitcher who has often been excruciating to watch.

In his 4+ seasons in Boston, Matsuzaka has notched a 49-30 record with a 4.25 ERA.  He has pitched 622.2 innings, recording 568 strikeouts, issuing 301 walks, and allowing 64 home runs.  His best season was in 2008, when he went 18-3 with a 2.90 ERA and played 4th in Cy Young voting.  In his very first season in the Majors, Matsuzaka recorded 15 wins and helped the Red Sox to their second World Series win in four years.

Since 2008, Daisuke has hit the DL multiple times each season, and has become as enigmatic as AJ Burnett when he is able to pitch.  He has been the opposite of Pedro Martinez, in that you attempt to buy tickets to ANY OTHER GAME because his performances are lame and forgettable as he nibbles around the strikezone for about 5 innings.

Remember the hype surrounding him back in the 206-2007 offseason?  He was coming, and then he wasn't.  And then he was, and he was bringing his gyroball with him.  THAT certainly never panned out, but we were all equally excited at the possibility.

The first season was satisfactory, and even if it hadn't been, it ended with a World Series, so any hiccups would have been swept under the rug in the honeymoon period.  2008 was fantastic, though Matzukaka didn't nail it down in the playoffs.

Since then, it's all been down hill.  16-15 in the last three years, and just 45 games started - I don't know about you, but I'm not all that torn up to be saying goodbye.  Sure, he's turned in a gem or two over the years, but the stinkers were much more consistent, and for me, much more memorable.  Sure, it's a lot of money lost, but it's not like John Henry can't afford it, eh?

I'M BACK!

And, in more exciting news, so are the Red Sox.  Despite the fact that the local nine only managed to split yesterday's doubleheader, they're still tied for first place in the AL East.  After that brutal beginning, who would have thought we'd recover by Memorial Day?

Admittedly, we owe some thanks to the Yankees and the Rays (and all of their successful opponents, of course) for dragging their feet out of the gate, as well.  Somehow, we've survived injuries to Daisuke Matsuzaka, and John Lackey, and while Lackey looks to be on his way back soonish, there are whispers of Tommy John surgery for Matsuzaka.

Tito claims that surgery is not a possibility, but there's also no word as to when the enigma will be returning.  Luckily, Alfredo Aceves and Tim Wakefield have been performing admirably in the meantime.  Each of these "placeholders" have notched two wins already this season, and it will be interesting to see who gets pushed into the bullpen when Lackey makes his (hopefully) triumphant return.

My bet is on Aceves, since he's the more conventional hurler, and Wakefield has made it known in recent years how he feels about the bullpen.  We all know about Tito's loyalty to his veterans, and Wake is the capital-"V" veteran of this team.

Whatever happens, I'm just SO HAPPY to be back home where I can watch EVERY Red Sox game on NESN on my very own TV, where I don't have to fight with the internet of MLB.tv, and where I can't go anywhere without seeing somebody wearing a Sox hat. Home sweet home, indeed.

Flirting with .500

Just when you think they're going to turn it around for good, and reach .500 for the first time since Opening day in Texas, they go and hand in a heartbreaker like last night's.  Jonny Lester wasn't himself last night,and he would be the first to say so, admitting that he let his emotions get to him during a first inning where he gave up three runs and the calls just weren't going his way.

Red Sox pitching gave up three home runs in last night's game, and the bats just couldn't keep up, despite homers from Adrian Gonzalez (2), and David Ortiz.  This was not the way the Sox wanted to open the series, with a loss, and Lester only able to pitch 5.1 innings, meaning that the bullpen was more heavily taxed than they would have hoped.

Tonight we have John Lackey going against Jesse Litch, before the Sox head south to New York for a three-game set.  There's an off-day in between, and the rotation has been shuffled so that Clay Buchholz,Josh Beckett, and Lester will pitch against the Bronx Bombers, and Daisuke Matsuzaka won't go until we face the Orioles next week.

Someday the Red Sox will get back to .500.... Maybe it will be this Friday.

Jon Lester is a BOSS.

The offense exploded for seven runs last night, as Jon Lester notched his fourth win of the young season.  The game seemed to go off without a hitch, and everything went as if scripted by Theo during the offseason: the starter threw 7 fantastic innings, and handed the ball off to the bullpen who finished the job.  All the while the lineup was performing well, as everyone but JD Drew and Dustin Pedroia had at least one hit.

So how good was Lester? Since MLB.tv seems to hate me in Argentina, I didn't actually get to watch him pitch, but the stat line is quite impressive.  Lester went seven full innings, scattered six hits, gave up just a single run (a homer from Trumbo), one walk, and eleven strikeouts. Yes, eleven strikeouts.

Peter Abraham of the Globe stated in the Extra Bases blog that Lester could be among the best of his generation, and I can't find many reasons to disagree.  The man is only 27 years old, and he owns a career winning percentage of of .714 (65-26).

Despite traditionally struggling mightily in April, Lester managed to win three games last month, and continued his dominance last night.  It's right about now that I'm wishing I had managed to draft him for my fantasy team - that was a failure on my part.

I suspect this isthe year that Lester finally gets his due, even among the more casual fans.  Of course, even the Cy Young winner can get ignored when he pitches for a small-market team (somewhere, King Felix weeps).  But Lester looks to be building a strong resume for the award (though it's very early), and the Red Sox are anything but small-market.  More than one sports periodical picked Jon Lester as the 2011 AL Cy Young winner, and he's not taking any prisoners along the way.

I'm guessing he's also really fun to watch during this stretch - it's too bad MLB.tv won't let me.

No offense?

Not last night. The Red Sox lineup came through in a big way during last night's game against Jered Weaver and the Angels, scoring nine runs, six of them in the bottom of the seventh inning, to assure Clay Buchholz of his second win of the season.

The Red Sox were 11-for-36 on the game, with two walks and seven strikeouts, and they extended their prodigious winning streak to TWO GAMES.

All sarcasm aside, last night's game was a gem, complete with a grinding battle pitting Dustin Pedroia against Weaver to score the go-ahead run in the bottom of the fifth inning (essentially guaranteeing the win for Buchholz, as the Sox did not trail after the fifth).  Pedey fouled off nine pitches in a 13-pitch at bat, before shooting a single back up the middle to score Carl Crawford from third.

Pedroia is one of the only players I have ever seen who can literally WILL himself to win: to win at-bats, to win ballgames, and even to win honors like ROY or MVP.  The man clearly has a lot of talent, and as much as I make fun of "intangibles" in this space, Pedey might be the King of them (sorry, Jetes).

Pedroia also went on to walk in the seventh inning, and come around to score on Adrian Gonzalez's 3-RBI double (Youkilis would then double to score Gonzalez, and David Ortiz bashed his second homer, scoring Youk).

This team seems to be back on track, or at least headed that way, as Adrian Gonzalez has 18 RBIs on the season, and Carl Crawford is 4-for-8 in May - hopefully a glimmer of things to come.  Now, the pitching needs to get back on a roll, perhaps jump-started by Clay Buchholz's performance last night. Despite putting ten men on base on eight hits and two walks in 6.2 innings, Buch gave up just two runs - pulling a "quality start" out of a start that was slightly less than quality.

I was concerned last night about Buch, since he was going against the previously 6-0, .99 ERA Jered Weaver, but, like the day before, my worries were for naught.  Tonight the Sox have Jon Lester facing off against Dan Haren - I don't think I should worry too much, but if this team has taught me anything, it's that games aren't played on paper.