Voice From The Nation

The Red Sox weathered the travel and fanfare of the Japan trip and followed that up with a short series in Oakland and now they head back to the east coast for a very tough stretch of games to start the year (the Major League Baseball schedule maker must have a Bronx address).

The next few series for the Red Sox consist of games against the Blue Jays, Tigers, Yankees, Indians, Yankees again, Rangers and Angels which would take them to the end of April. With the ramifications of the lingering effects of the Japan trip still unknown, the Boston team will face quite a challenge against stiff competion for the foreseeable future. As a Red Sox fan, you would have to hope they can take their now 3-1 record and make it out of the rest of April in one piece.

There are several positives to consider from the beginning of the season though. One significant piece of news is that Bartolo Colon looked phenomenal in his start in the season opener for the Pawtucket Red Sox (AAA). He looks like he could really turn out to be a factor for the Red Sox if he continues at this pace. He pitched five shutout innings allowing only one hit and topped out at 96 mph. The most positive news is that he says his arm feels great and he is pitching without effort. Considering the last time he was healthy in 2005 he won the Cy Young, the sky could be the limit for his contribution. Another positive is that Lester and Dice-K both looked great in their last starts allowing one run combined. Of course, that was against Oakland, but we will take what we can get at this point.

It definitely feels like the season has officially kicked off and now it's time to strap in and get ready for an exciting April. The Red Sox wear a target on their backs from being the defending champs and should expect to get every the A game from every team. Considering the teams they are facing, those A games will be challenging.

Posted by jim being jim at 08:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

We are now firmly immersed in "that time of year". The period of time between the end of the holiday season up until the day pitchers and catchers report to spring training. This is the baseball equivalent of the dead zone.  

In this day and age, the hot stove season usually heats up right at the conclusion of the World Series and maintains momentum until the end of the year, but things cool down considerably in January and February. In past years there have been some big splashes in those months, but they have been few and far between and not nearly enough of the daily dose of the baseball news that fans covet.

I guess we shouldn't complain about something that entertains us on some level for 10 of the 12 months of the year, but for baseball fans that have grown accustomed to a daily ritual of ingesting news and information, this is the drought season. These fans can be found feverishly bouncing from one website to another, looking for anything and everything related to their team or in a pinch any baseball team. Red Sox fans are disheartened when they check Boston.com or BostonHerald.com and see that the latest articles are still the old ones from last week. At this point it's big news when the Red Sox sign their backup catcher for another year or a rumor arises about acquiring a left handed hitter for the bench.

Most fans have grown tired of all the steroids conversation and have had all they could take of Roger Clemens talk at this point. The non-action and speculation on Johan Santana has also been beaten into the ground. We don't even want to hear about those trade rumors until someone pulls the trigger. It's nice to hear about how Manny is working out hard in Arizona with Youkilis and Pedroia, but it's not enough.

Boston.com may be onto something when it displays the countdown ticker to spring training which at the writing of this article stands at over 20 long days away. The ticker counts down to the second and many baseball fans will be counting the seconds until they once again can sit with their coffee in the morning and read puff pieces about the players or the latest news items from Fort Myers. The first two games of the regular season will take place in Japan with a start time of 6 a.m. So get ready to set your alarms at the end of March.  

Posted by jim being jim at 06:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Baseball fans have been inundated with Johan Santana talk since the last pitch of the World Series. Rumors have heated up and cooled down. Trade proposals have been leaked and then rigorously debated in the media, blogs, message boards and around the water cooler. Fans of the teams rumored to be involved have agonized over the players named in the discussions and have wrestled with their own internal debates.

The northeast has been hit especially hard by the Santana sweepstakes with both the Red Sox and Yankees prominently involved in the nearly daily tug of war for his services. One day we hear Jon Lester is having a physical and a deal is as good as done for the Red Sox and then the next day we hear the Yankees are very close. With all of the attention, Santana has become more than just a player, he represents the balance of power between these two über teams. For the Yankees, he is the number one starter the team so desperately needs to get back to glory. The final piece of the puzzle that allows Wang and Pettitte to move down in the rotation and suddenly makes the entire pitching staff look significantly better. For the Red Sox, he would be matched up with Beckett, Dice K, Schilling and the young Buckholtz to form one of the greatest rotations in baseball history.

The problems arise when the names rumored to be going to Minnesota are mentioned. For the first time in a very long time both the Red Sox and Yankees have significant prospects coming up through their systems. Both fan bases have embraced these players as a sign of better days ahead for their teams with rosters filled with home grown stars that you can be proud of instead of a contingent of mercenary players for hire.  

As great as Santana would be in the rotation, it would be tough for a Red Sox fan to see some combination of Lester, Ellsbury, Buckholtz, Lowrie or Masterson go in a package to Minnesota. Not to mention the fact that the added $25 million in payroll it would take to sign Santana past 2008 would inflate the Red Sox payroll into dreaded Yankees' territory. It seems safer, wiser and in some ways almost proper not to make the trade.

If the Red Sox do not pull the trigger, the likelihood of the Yankees getting the prized pitcher increases significantly. The Yankees would also have to pine over giving up mega prospects like Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy as well as good young players like Melky Cabrera in a package that would entice the Twins. Adding Santana to the Yankees with their already unmatched offense and solid pitching would make Red Sons fans shutter.

So where does that leave us? Well, in my opinion, the best-case scenario would be he stays put in Minnnesota or even better he gets traded to the National League. Currently the only National League team that has been mentioned significantly in the trade talks has been the Mets and the general consensus is that they do not have enough to offer to interest Minnesota. But we can dream. In a perfect world we keep the nucleus of the perfect mix of young and veteran players in Boston intact and Santana stays away from the New York (at least, the Yankees). I would take that outcome and then let the chips fall from there in 2008.

Posted by jim being jim at 05:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)