Lowell Goes on the DL – Dice-K Might Be There ‘til September

Last I updated, I mentioned Lowrie had to exit a rehab game early.  Fortunately for Lowrie, this wasn’t a setback.  However, yesterday word came out that Dice-K was going to be on the DL for longer than 15 days.  While we may have already known that, I don’t think any of us were expecting him to be on there for as long September 1^st. 

According to Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe, the Sox are looking as far as that for the Japanese pitcher to return.  Cafardo also mentioned that a source said Dice-K insisted that he did not need to the same strengthening program that the Red Sox pitchers were required to perform in the offseason.  There doesn’t seem to be much evidence of whether or not this is true, but I hope it’s not.  After all, RSN seems to be upset enough about Dice-K right now.  That sure won’t help plead his case.  Here’s the article written by Cafarado.  It’s mainly about Alex Cora (and also an interview with Julian Tavarez) but gives tidbits of information after.  One of these tidbits is where I got the info on Dice-K:

http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/articles/2009/06/28/a_p

The only other thing I wanna say on the Diceman is that this isn’t the end of the world.  We have Smoltz who will be making his second appearance in a Sox uniform tonight, while Clay Buchholz is probably praying for someone else to go on the DL so he can make it back up to Boston.  I’m not worried, but it’s not good news either. 

Now here’s something we can worry about – Mike Lowell was placed on the 15 day DL earlier today.  All throughout the season it’s been evident that he’s been hurting.  It seems every time he hits a groundball to the infield, he’s nowhere near first base when the ball gets there.  That being said, he still seemed to be moving around third base okay, and was putting up decent numbers (.282, 10 HR, 41 RBI).  I hope that this is just a 15 day thing, and not a 45 day thing.  Keep your fingers crossed.  The only good news of this is that Jeff Bailey will be taking Lowell’s spot on the roster.  I like Bailey.  We might even get to see him hit a dinger or two before he has to go back down, again.  I’m sure he’s thrilled to be back up in Boston. 

Keep the Faith.