Red Sox Coming Back to Boston, Rays Staying in Tampa Bay

This was why the Red Sox got Jake Peavy. They wanted a good pitcher to anchor the bottom of the rotation. And Peavy came through for the Sox last night. So did Craig Breslow, Junichi Tazawa, and of course Koji Uehara. Those 4 pitchers combined for 9 innings, allowing just 1 run, 6 hits (only 1 for extra-bases), 0 walks, and struck out 10.

By the way, Jose Iglesias is 1 for 12 in the other ALDS. That trade's looking better and better.

The Rays played with fire for most of this game. Their pitchers enjoyed some fortunate double plays to get out of jams. Manager Joe Maddon went with an unorthodox strategy that seemed to work for a time. But how many different pitchers can you bring into a game before one of them just doesn't get the job done?

Joe Maddon has a bit of Bobby Valentine in him. He tries too hard to influence the outcome of the game through his managerial decisions. Sometimes the best thing a manager can do is step back and let his players play, choosing the right time to make one or two smart moves, instead of trying to make a dozen good moves every night.

John Farrell will get credit for pinch-hitting Xander Bogaerts in the 7th, but give the credit to Bogaerts for working a walk. He didn't look like someone who just turned 21 on October 1st and started the season in AA Portland. That was a mature plate appearance for such a young player.

Then the Rays made mistakes. Which they've done all series long. And the Red Sox capitalized on those mistakes. Which they've done all series long. The Sox used their speed to exploit Tampa Bay's miscues. Bogaerts scored on a wild pitch, Ellsbury advanced to third after stealing second on the play, then Victorino legged out an infield single. The Sox scored the tying and winning runs without a ball leaving the infield.

That's how they've won all season long. Whatever it takes, they'll find some way to win. The pitching was great, the offense struggled at first then took advantage of one mistake to score 2 runs. This team seems to will itself to victory.

Now they have a few days off, waiting for the Athletics/Tigers series to resolve itself. Jon Lester gets to rest while those two teams hopefully wear each other out.

Game 1 of the ALCS is Saturday at Fenway Park.

In conclusion, here's Jonny Gomes doing a crazy sprinkler dance...

Photo Credit:
Steve Mitchell - USA Today Sports

Dear Tampa Bay Rays, Your Ballpark Sucks

Tropicana Field is the stupidest, silliest ballpark in the Majors. The park's ground rules are like backyard wiffle ball rules. I remember in my backyard our porch jutted into the field of play, slicing across the imaginary foul line. So if a ball landed in the fair part of the porch, it was a ground-rule triple. It was a stupid, silly rule and we knew it. Tampa Bay is a Major League facility with stupid catwalks. If a ball hits them in foul territory, then the ball is dead. If a ball hits some of them in fair territory, it's a homerun. What the hell?

Then the white roof. What was wrong with a darker shade?

Fenway Park has its own weird set of nooks and crannies. But those have history, and were often out of necessity. There's a story behind each one of Fenway's quirks. The story behind each of the Trop's annoying oddities is that the stadium is poorly designed. Plain and simple.

Then there's the onslaught of noise pumped through the speakers. Listening on the radio and the artificial sound generation is obvious. The music blares, and it's relentless in both volume and frequency.

Everybody clap your hands...

Finally, the fans suck. The Oakland Athletic removed tarps in their park to accommodate the demand for tickets to their recent playoff games. The Rays didn't have to do that with their tarped off sections. For Game 7 of the 2008 ALCS, the biggest game in their franchise's history, a friend of mine was able to get tickets at face value the day of the game. That shouldn't be possible for a game of such magnitude.

Everyone always said that when the Rays became competitive, the people would come. That hasn't really happened. The people come when the Red Sox and Yankees come. The Rays were dead last in attendance this year. 18,645 per game. 900 more people per game went to see the 100-loss Marlins play. On average, 45.3% of Tropicana Field's seats are empty. And that doesn't include the tarped sections.

Worst ballpark in the country, worst fans in baseball.

Red Sox Can't Sink Rays

It was a game of mistakes. Fielding mistakes, pitching mistakes, maybe even some managerial mistakes. And the winner was the team that capitalized on those mistakes just a little bit more than the loser.

The play of the game was Evan Longoria's 3-run homer in the 5th. If Clay Buchholz is able to get Longoria out, or even hold him to a 1-run or 2-run hit, then the game plays out in a completely different way. All Buchholz had to do in that at-bat was not give up a homerun. Longoria won that battle.

The Rays continued to make fielding miscues and errors. Even the umps made mistakes. The Red Sox took advantage of most, but not all of these mistakes. The Sox never made any big hits on their own. They scored their runs off groundouts, a wild pitch, and a soft David Ortiz single. That run knocked in by Ortiz was the only Sox run driven in by a hit. The Sox were 2 for 14 with runners in scoring position.

The Rays took advantage of a glaring Red Sox weakness: the middle relievers. Franklin Morales and Brandon Workman combined to allow the Rays to take the lead in the 8th inning. Overall, the Rays bullpen executed slightly better (4 innings, 2 hits, 1 run) than the Red Sox bullpen (2.2 innings, 4 hits, 2 runs). And that was one of the deciding differences.

So Game 4 tonight at 8:37. That start-time worries me because Monday night's game took 4 hours and 19 minutes. If that happens tonight then the game will end around 1 o'clock in the morning.

Jake Peavy takes the mound for his first playoff start in a Red Sox uniform. He faces Jeremy Hellickson. Peavy has only made 2 career postseason starts, the last in 2006. He was lousy in both. Fortunately the Rays don't hit him very well. Unfortunately, the Red Sox don't hit Hellickson very well either. Except for Ortiz (.375 with 3 HRs in his career against Hellickson) and Saltalamacchia (.320, also with 3 HRs).

Expect another game decided by mistakes and the ability to capitalize on and minimize the impact of those mistakes.

Photo Credit:
AP Photo/Mike Carlson

Six in 'Nati (Get It? Like Cincinnati, and Also the Painfully Low Number of Points the Patriots Scored)

We should have known this type of game was possible. In the past we've seen the Patriots' offense fail to do enough to carry the team to victory. But Sunday afternoon they did NOTHING to help win the game. The defense played well enough for the team to win. The offense didn't. The offense lost the game.

The Patriots haven't been held to 6 points since 1996. That meaningless touchdown streak Brady had came to an end. The Pats were 1 for 12 on 3rd down. Brady threw 20 incompletions compared with 18 completions. The best non-defensive performers on the team were Stephen Gostkowski and punter Ryan Allen.

And I'm primarily going to blame Tom Brady. He just doesn't look sharp. Every catch seems difficult, miraculous at times. On Sunday he overthrew, underthrew, and completely missed receivers. There were occasions when Dobson didn't run the route that Brady expected, there were also occasions when Brady was horribly inaccurate when throwing downfield, especially in the middle of the field. Even when he and the receivers connect, the catches are hard and off-stride.

Smaller portions of blame go to Danny Amendola, who had a big drop in the 4th quarter (he's looking more and more like Wes Welker). Brandon Bolden dropped a few passes. LeGarrette Blount fumbled. Let's not forget all of that.

I'll also blame the play-calling. The wide receivers still don't seem to be on the same page with Brady. So maybe it's time to go with a simpler page. Especially in the 4th quarter when you're down by a score. I don't remember the offensive playbook being so complex when the Patriots didn't have Pro Bowlers running routes, back from 2001 to 2006. Maybe going back to basics wouldn't be such a bad thing.

And the Red Zone play-calling irritated me more than anything. A token jumbo package run that failed. By the way, I've been told that Blount isn't a very good short yardage back, despite his bulk. I believe that. The Pats then went from simple play to cute trickery, throwing a pass to Nate Solder. Why? The 3rd down play was a good call, it just didn't work. I would have liked to see the Patriots try that on 2nd down, then again on 3rd if it failed.

On the bright side, the defense continues to play well. They pressured Dalton, and sacked him at key times. They held Green, Gresham, and Eifert to 138 combined yards, which isn't bad at all. And they were a 4th down stop away from bringing this game into overtime, despite how Godawful the offense was playing. The defense gave Brady so many chances for a game-winning drive. Brady and the offense failed to deliver.

The Patriots host the Saints next weekend. That's kind of a big game. But as we've seen between the Pats win over Atlanta, and now their loss to Cincinnati, you're only as good as you play each week. So don't panic about this loss, and don't develop an anxiety disorder if the Saints come to town and win (and don't plan a Super Bowl trip if the Pats win). This is a week to week spot, take it one week at a time.

Photo Credit:
Marc Lebryk - USA Today

Patriots-Bengals Drinking Game

In honor of the game's host city, Cincinnati, a.k.a. The Nati, massive bonus points will be awarded for drinking Natty Light/Ice during this game. God bless you, you sad, drunken mess. Here are the guidelines for this week's game:

Anytime a commentator says...
"Patchwork" = take 1 drink of beer
"Rookie" = 1 drink
"No-name" = 1 drink
"Amendola" = 1 drink
"Trust" (when talking about a Patriots WR and Brady) = 1 drink
"Comfort" (same condition as above) = 1 drink
"Wes Welker" = 1 drink
"Chad" = 1 drink
"Johnson" = 1 drink
"Ochocinco" = drink for 85 seconds
"Corey Dillon" = drink for 28 seconds
"Hole" = 1 drink
An abbreviation for Michael Hoomanawanui's last name = 1 drink
A joke about the difficulty of Hoomanawanui's name = 1 drink

Anytime this is on screen...
A tiger statue or other facsimile of a tiger = 1 drink
An actual tiger = 1 whole beer
Iso-shot of Aqib Talib covering someone = 1 drink
The Ohio River = 1 drink
Image of Rob Gronkowski = 1 drink
Bob Kraft = 1 drink
Kraft talking to someone = drink the entire time he's talking
Bill Belichick's sock(s) = drink an entire beer and a shot

Anytime this happens...
You get frustrated at a Patriots WR making a mistake/drop = drink a shot
Tom Brady gets frustrated at a Pats WR = drink beer for 12 seconds
Tom Brady yells "Aplha Milk" = Drink 1 White Russian
Brady points out the "Mike" = 1 drink (or 3 drinks from Mike's Hard Lemonade for bonus points)
Patriots WR runs wrong route = 1 drink
Patriots WR drops pass = 1 drink
Brady throws to a tight-end (excluding Gronk) = 1 shot of liquor

Red Sox Win First Playoff Game In 5 Years

It's been 4 years since Boston hosted playoff baseball. It's been 5 years since we've seen our team win a playoff game. That drought came to an end Friday afternoon thanks to a flood of Red Sox runs, and an outstanding performance by Jon Lester.

The play of the game was a miscue by Rays right-fielder Wil Myers. Pitcher Matt Moore was cruising until the 4th inning when David Ortiz hit a long fly to deep right-field. As Myers tracked the ball, he waved off the center-fielder. Myers suddenly stopped and ran away from where the ball was going to land, as if he'd heard center-fielder Desmond Jennings call him off. The ball landed, bouncing into the Red Sox bullpen for a ground-rule double.

I have a strong suspicion that some of the Sox relievers in the bullpen yelled at Myers, "calling" for the fly-ball, making the 22-year old rookie think that his teammate was right behind him, waiting to make the catch. Center-fielders typically have the authority to wave off other outfielders when trying to catch fly-balls.

So instead of 1 on and 1 out, the Sox had runners on 2nd and 3rd with 0 outs. A 5-run rally ensued. Jonny Gomes hit a wall-ball double, Stephen Drew ran out an infield single that saw Gomes hustle to score from second. Will Middlebrooks hit a double, knocking in Drew. Then Shane Victorino singled to drive Middlebrooks in.

Myers received quite a bit of heckling from the Fenway crowd after the play, which was scored a double and not an error. However, Tampa Bay pitcher Matt Moore should be forced to eat a few slices of the proverbial blame pie. After the miscue, Moore allowed two more doubles in the inning, four hits total, he failed to cover first base in time on Drew's single, then didn't notice Gomes running home in time to throw him out. And in the next inning Moore allowed more doubles, more runs, and was eventually pulled.

So blame Myers for the rally starting, and blame Moore for the size of the rally.

Every Sox starter got a hit in the game and scored a run. The only two who didn't record an RBI were Pedroia and Ortiz.

Meanwhile, Jon Lester dominated the Rays with the exception of 2 pitches. He allowed a pair of homeruns, although crucially they were solo homeruns. He only allowed 6 baserunners in his 7.2 innings, and he struck out 7, including the first 4 Rays he faced. He established his dominance in the 1st by striking out the side, and he shut down the Rays in the top of the 5th after his teammates gave him a lead. Lester pitched like an Ace in his first postseason game since 2009.

John Lackey faces David Price Saturday evening at 5:37 P.M.. Lackey pitches better at Fenway which is why he gets the ball for Game 2 and not Clay Buchholz.

Photo Credit:
Bob DeChiara - USA Today Sports

Koji Uehara's High-Five Tour

Thanks to MLB Fan Cave for the video.

Holy Shit It's Hockey Season Already?

So you're telling me that the Red Sox are in the playoffs, the Patriots are in first, and the NHL is going to start on time? How different does October 2013 feel from October 2012?

The Bruins have changed more this off-season than they have changed in years. Most of the core remains. But no more hoping Tyler Seguin explodes for a 40-goal season. No more quiet, steady leadership from Andrew Ference. No more strong forward play from Nathan Horton.

Oh and the division and playoffs have completely changed. Joining the 5 teams from last year's Northeast Division will be the Red Wings, Lightning, and Panthers. The Panthers just signed a goalie named Tim Thomas, by the way. For the playoffs, the first two rounds will be within the division, with the possible inclusion of a wild-card team from another division.

The B's replaced Seguin and Horton with Loui Eriksson and Jaroma Iginla. I'm excited to see Eriksson and what he can produce. He scored 36 goals a few years ago, hasn't scored more than 30 since. Nor has he scored less than 20 in a full season. So is he a solid contributor that you notice, or does he score random, easy goals when everyone else is scoring?

Then there's Iginla. Who will have to win me over. Most true Bruins fans have one Bruin that they strongly dislike. I don't know who that will be for me this season. Iginla is a strong candidate. The world knows Iginla can play hockey. Can he play Bruins hockey? I wasn't impressed with the defensive play of Pittsburgh's forwards in last season's playoffs. Was that a team thing, or is that how Iginla will play here? I hope he wins me over.

The Bruins are looking at a new generation of young players to fill other holes. Torey Krug electrified in the playoffs, now he has to play strong defense day in and day out. Dougie Hamilton will be asked to take another step forward in his development. 21-year-old Ryan Spooner will start the season in Providence. Carl Soderberg has tremendous talent and fire, but he's 27 and has yet to escape Sweden and make the NHL. Why is that?

The Bruins need to score more. The formula that won the Cup in '11 no longer holds. The defense is still strong, the goalie is great, but neither the defense or the goalie is superhuman like they were in 2011. The offense needs to take the pressure off the defense to be perfect.

The B's can't afford to have a 3rd line that doesn't score at all. Not unless the top two lines seriously increase their production. Or even more feasibly, the PP unit scores in games that the B's can't get anything going with their even-strengthed offense. The Bruins were ranked 26th in power play scoring last year. They were 13th in overall goals per game. The power play is the area of offense that has the most room to improve.

If the power play becomes a decent threat, then the Bruins will have a very good offense.

If the power play becomes a dangerous weapon, then they'll have one of the best offenses in hockey.

Eriksson can produce on the power play. So can Iginla. So can Krug. But so could Seguin. More forwards need to figure out how to score when the B's have a man advantage. It's preposterous how long the power play has been an issue with this team. It doesn't have to be great, just okay would be nice.

This season is going to be long. 82-games plus a break for the Olympics. And we'll see how the new playoff format works out. I'm not a big fan. If it wasn't broken, why did it need to be fixed. One exciting thing is that the B's have had great playoff series with the Leafs, Canadiens, and Sabres. That's exciting, but it could also be dangerous.

Prediction time. The Bruins win the Atlantic Division but lose in the 2nd round of the playoffs in a 7-game series. Hopefully I'm wrong. If they can get their power play to function, then the sky's the limit.