I hate the Rockies. I hate Coors Fields. I don't love the Red Sox, but at least they aren't the Yankees. Congratulations on your sweep of this pathetic team and your second World Series in four years. Curse?

Boston Red Sox Forum

Colorado Rockies Forum

Yes I am posting this in the 5th inning, that's how much I think the Rockies suck. I'll leave it up even if they have a come back and win the game at that Godforsaken Coors Field.

Labels: Boston Red Sox, Colorado Rockies

The first World Series games to be played in Colorado's Coors Field are coming up (games 3 and 4 of this year's World Series.) What a shame. Coors Field is a pox on major league baseball. It's a far greater threat to the "statistical integrity" of baseball than PEDs. Why? Because everyone can (and it's clear most do) take performance enhancing drugs, only Rockies hitters get to play half of their games at Coors Field!

Anyway, to the Series itself. I can't I'm thrilled about this match up but I am rooting for the Red Sox. I hate these sort of half assed expansion teams like the Rockies. They can go straight to hell along with the Diamondbacks, Marlins, and Devil Rays.

A simple 3 step fix for the MLB playoffs:

1. Go back to two divisions in each league.
2. Get rid of the wild card.
3. Make the division playoffs and the World Series 9 games.

With this set up you are much more likely to have the best team come out on top and you are also much more likely to have a great World Series match up instead of this sort of boring nonsense. The most recent expansion teams should be folded up, especially the Rockies. Coors Field is ridiculous. And I would love to see what kind of numbers Matt Holliday & Todd Helton would put up without having Coors Field to come home to.

Home-Away Splits In 2007:

Matt Holliday: .376 with 25 homers in Colorado, .301 with 11 homers on the road.

Todd Helton: .333 with 9 homers in Colorado, .308 with 8 homers on the road.

Admittedly Helton's numbers weren't that skewed this year but they usually are. From 2004 to 2006 he hit .341 at home and .288 on the road.

Holliday won the NL batting title this year. That's a travesty. Forget the PED BS. Holliday is a .300 hitter getting credit as a .340 hitter because he plays in Coors Field. That's complete crap and unfair to the real 2007 NL batting champ Chipper Jones who hit .337 (.353 AWAY vs. .320 HOME.)

Imagine if a great hitter ever plays in Colorado? (and NO Todd Helton and Matt Holliday are not great hitters, that's my whole point here.) Imagine if Barry Bonds had been in Colorado from 2000 to 2007? He'd have hit .400 at least twice and would probably be well over 800 homers by now.

Labels: Boston Red Sox, Colorado Rockies

Red Sox rookie pitcher Clay Buchholz threw a no hitter in only his second career start tonight the Red Sox 10 to 0 win over the Baltimore Orioles in Boston. He is now 2-0 with a 1.80 ERA.

Buchholz became the 3rd major leaguer in history to throw a no hitter in his first or second career start.

The other two? Bobo Holloman who did it in his first start in 1953 and Wilson Alvarez who did it in his second start in 1991.

Certainly the Red Sox hope that Buchholz, 23, has a better career than Alvarez (102-92, 3.95) and Holloman (3-7, 5.23) - Holloman was 30 years old as a rookie in 1953 and after his amazing start he went 2-7 the rest of the season. Alvarez had some good seasons (1993 in particular when he went 15-8 with a 2.95 ERA) but overall he was an average pitcher during his career. Alvarez was also named as a steroids user in Jose Canseco's book, but Alvarez has maintained he never took steroids. He has not pitched since 2005.

Buccholz' no hitter overshadowed the debut of fellow rookie pitcher Ian Kennedy who had a strong start for the rival Yankees. Kennedy allowed 5 hits and 3 runs (only 1 earned) in 7 innings. He struck out 6 and walked 2. He got the win as the Yankees topped the Devil Rays in New York 9 to 6.

Labels: Boston Red Sox, Clay Buchholz

The Red Sox have won 5 in a row to move over .700 at 36-15. The way they are currently playing they have a shot at the American League record of 116 wins (.716 winning percentage) set by the Seattle Mariners in 2001. These Red Sox are currently on pace to win 114 games. Even better news for Red Sox fans? They are on pace to crush the Yankees by over 40 games! Yes you read that right, if the current trends continue as they are the Red Sox will finish the year 46 games ahead of the Yanks.

So how are they doing it?

Let's start with the pitching:

Josh Beckett is having an outstanding season with an 8-0 record and a 2.65 ERA. Tim Wakefield while his record is only 5-5 is pitching very well with a 3.36 ERA. Curt Shilling is doing well at 5-2 with a 3.68 ERA. Daisuke Matsuzaka has in some ways been a disappointment so far as his ERA is a subpar 4.43 but he is racking up the strikeouts (8.6 per 9 innings) and he has a great 7-2 record. The only Boston starter who is really not getting the job done is Julian Tavarez who is sitting at 3-4 with a 5.40 ERA.

Jonathan Papelbon has been awesome again this year in the closer spot (while the rival Yankees Mariano Rivera is having an awful year.) Papelbon has 28 strikeouts in 19.1 innings. He's got 13 saves and a 1.86 ERA.

Hitting:

David Ortiz is having another great year. He ranks in the top 10 in the AL in 2B, RBI, OBP, OPS, BB, and SLG. Ortiz is hitting .316 with 9 home runs, 20 doubles, and 38 RBI.

You expect great things from a hitter like Ortiz but I think it's the great performances they are getting from Keven Youkilis and Mike Lowell that are really pushing them over the top.

1B Youkilis is currently riding a 21 game hitting streak that has pushed his batting average all the way up to .358 (good for 3rd in the AL.) Youkilis previous high batting average was .279 from last year. Youkilis also has 8 home rusn putting him on pace for 27 for the year. Last year he had his career high with only 12 home runs. Youkilis ranks among the AL leaders in batting average, OBP, OPS, runs, and slugging percentage.

3B Lowell is in the midst of a career year. His previous best batting average was .293 in 2004, this year he's hitting .326 while leading the Red Sox with 39 RBI. Lowell is in the top 10 in the AL in batting average, RBI, OPS, and slugging percentage.

These breakout performances from Youkilis and Lowell are making up for the subpar year that Manny Ramirez is having.

Future Hall of Famer LF Ramirez is hitting far below his outstanding career rates of .313/.409/.596 - This year he's only at .268/.353/.453... If Ramirez were hitting like his usual self the Red Sox would probably be on a 120 win pace.

Labels: Boston Red Sox

One important aspect of being a baseball fan is the realization that fans of other teams are stupid and misguided. While one could make a horrible joke about Cardinal’s pitchers and Denver Broncos’ life expectancies, I’ll go the nicer route. By nicer I mean talking about how stupid your GM’s are compared to mine. Also, I’m only making fun of the other writers for now so we can get a nice rivalry going and bicker, like people are supposed to do on the internet. Wait, isn’t the internet for porn? Oh well…

Cardinals:
Mulder Trade:
FROM A’s:
SP Mark Mulder (Despite the fact that his stats were dropping, and he was frequently injured in the last year on the A’s due to a fault in his mechanics, he had the most talent of any of the A’s vaunted “Big Three,” Cardinals fan’s might remember this SEE: Body explodes)
FROM Cardinals:
SP Dan Haren (Sweet, our opening day starter)
RP Kiko Calero (Awesome, set up man)
1b/c (He’s gonna be a DH) Daric Barton. (Your best prospect)

From A’s: (2002)
CL Jason Isringhausen
From Cardinals:
1st Round, 30th Pick (SP Ben Fritz) Up and down, dependant on if his arm explodes, Doing well in AA right now
1st Round, 39th Pick (Sandwich Pick) (3b Mark Teahen) Traded in Carlos Beltran deal 3 way for Octovial Dotel

Red Sox:
From A’s: (2004)
CL Keith Foulke (Uhm, yeah)
From Red Sox:
1st Round 24h Pick (Landon Powell C) Injured but has recovered, good prospect behind Suzaki who is in AAA right now. BY KENDALL *waves*
1st Round 36th Pick (Danny Putnam OF) Playing in the majors since the A’s OF is a Triage Unit.

From A’s: (2002)
CF Johnny Damon
From Red Sox:
1st Round 16th Pick (Nick Swisher RF/CF/LF/1B) How’s Coco Crisp working out? Oh, Sorry 
!st Round 37th Pick (Steve Obenchain SP) Ok he sucks, everyone gets one. Injured and possibly dead of a Crystal Meth Overdose.

Jay Payton OF, Traded for a broken Chad Bradford (Arm Explosion) when you pissed him off.

San Francisco
FROM A’s: (2003)
Ray Durham (Taken from White Sox GM Kenny Williams for shiny beads (Jon Adkins), played on the A’s for 3 months) Helped A’s get to playoffs.
FROM Giants:
1st Round, 26th pick in 2003 MLB Draft (Brian Snyder 3B) Now a second basemen, had a good first year in 04, struggled last two years and back up to AA this year.
1st Round 33rd pick (Sandwich pick) (2B/SS Omar Quintanilla) Traded with OF Eric Byrnes to Colorado in the 2005 Season for SP/RP Joe Kennedy, and RP Jay Witasick. The point of this trade being that Beane jumped the trade market by a month and took relievers off the market one month before the non-waiver trading deadline. (Both still on the A’s, Kennedy has started and been a reliever since, Witasick out of the bullpen)

I don't want to hear anything about some McGwire trade from the Cardinals, Beane wasn't incharge for that thing. Nor any Jimmy Foxx, Lefty Grove to the Sox, or the explosion of Charles Finley in the 70's. No one is allowed to mention the Tim Hudson trade either. Jerks.

Labels: Billy Beane, Boston Red Sox, Moneyball, Oakland A's, San Francisco Giants, St. Louis Cardinals, YOU GOT SERVED.

Dice K got off to an awesome start to his MLB career today by throwing 10 strike outs in 7 innings and allowing just 1 run (a home run) and 6 hits (and 1 walk) as the Red Sox beat the Royals 4 to 1.

Red Sox fans have to be excited. (Forrest?)

If this start is not a fluke and in fact a good indication of Dice K's skills then the Red Sox may have one of the best rotations in baseball (and then if Rocket is comes back to Boston?..)

I got to say, people of the universe, I think the Red Sox are going to top the Yankees this year in the AL East.

Labels: Boston Red Sox, Dice K