Tony Rossi's Boston Red Sox fan blog

At 1:51 PM today, I got a text saying that the Sox acquired Adam LaRoche from Pittsburgh.  I had heard the name many times, but had never followed him much.  So I looked him up online and found out that LaRoche is a first baseman and will be used to give Lowell some days off.  I was pretty excited about this.  And with our recent struggles, why not grab another bat?

Then it hit me – What about Mark Kotsay?  Don’t we already use him to give Lowell days off and to get some playing time at first?  After analyzing this trade, it was my understanding that Kotsay has been on the DL and the Sox simply wanted to make sure we had another utility first baseman.  Thinking about it a little more, this might be another Sean Casey situation.  Last year we acquired Mark Kotsay when we already had Sean Casey as our utility first baseman.  Casey found his playing time dwindling as each day passed until eventually we rarely saw him.  I personally didn’t understand it, considering Casey was putting up good numbers and was a decent first baseman. 

Continue reading "Look out Kostay – LaRoche is coming through"

According to Ian Browne from redsox.com, Wakefield was one of the pitchers they were saving in the case that the game went into extra innings.  “Okay,” one might say, “then why did it have to be Wake? Why did they have to save both him and Beckett for extras?”  Ian Browne comes to the rescue again saying that Wakefield was well rested.  I also think that they took into consideration his ability to pitch more than one inning without hurting himself.   Wakefield is blessed with being able to pitch without his full five days rest because of the slow knuckleball.  In addition, Maddon was told to save extra pitchers because last year both the AL and the NL nearly ran out (who could forget that 15 inning game?)  So Wakefield was on the list of pitchers to save in case of extra innings. 

Continue reading "Why Wakefield Didn’t Get To Pitch in the All Star Game"

The Boston Red Sox announced on Sunday that Clay Buchholz will be returning to Boston to start Friday night’s game against the Toronot Blue Jays. 

Buchholz has been waiting a while for this call, and who can blame him?  The twenty five-year old has pitched phenomenal in Pawtucket, posting a 7-2 record with a 2.36 era.  On May 25th, he nearly threw a perfect game, but had it broken up in the 9th with a hit.  He finished the game recording a complete game shut-out.  Who wouldn’t want out of Triple-A with a season like that?    

Then again everyone playing in Triple-A wants out so that they can make it to the big leagues. 

But now it’s Buchholz’s turn, and I wish him the best of luck.  A roster move will be announced within the next day or so which means someone’s going back down to Pawtucket.  I’d suspect it would be Bates, considering Lowell is coming off the DL. 

Continue reading "Buchholz is Back"

I saw the replay of last night’s game where Jacoby Ellsbury earned himself his first career ejection.  In the fifth inning, Ellsbury slid into home on a close play at the plate where he was called out.  Replays indicated that he was indeed safe.  Jacoby threw down his helmet violently in disgust.  Although home plate umpire Derryl Cousins had his back turned during all of this, he must have overheard Jacoby’s angry reactions.  In addition to that was Ellsbury’s helmet which was rolling around close to the on deck circle.  After seeing all this, Cousins decided that Ellsbury would have to leave the game. 

Earlier this week, good old Manny Ramirez also got ejected for tossing his arm guard near home plate umpire John Hirschbeck.  The only difference here was that Ramirez had been arguing with Hirschbeck earlier in the evening (although apologized for it in his next at bat).  Other than that it was a very similar scenario – Manny got called out on a terrible strike call, after which he tossed his arm guard up in the air in disgust.  Hirschbeck had his back turned to Ramirez, but heard the arm guard land at home plate, very close to where he was standing.  Hirschbeck tossed him on the spot. 

Continue reading "What Is It With All These Ejections??"

I very fortunate to be at last night’s game.  I say fortunate because there were some special moments last night.  That being said, it was one of the most frustrating Red Sox games I’ve ever been to. 

But I’m not gonna talk about that.

I’m not gonna talk about how much I anticipated eating a Fenway Frank and how disappointed I was with the new brand they use.  I’m not gonna talk about how there was a pole in my way so that third base was completely blocked and it was very difficult to see the pitcher’s mound.  And I’m certainly not going to talk about how frustrating it was to watch our offense last night. 

What I do wanna talk about is how emotional it was in the ballpark when Nomar Garciaparra came to bat for the first time at Fenway Park since 2004.  As he was lead off the second inning, fans were already getting out of their seats to cheer for him as he was walking towards the plate.  He was clearly very touched by the reception he got, which seemed as if it would never end.  I knew I didn’t want to stop clapping for him.  It was the first time I got to in years and now I realized how much I missed it.   What a great moment at Fenway Park.  I’m glad that I was there for it.  It’ll be hard to forget.  

Continue reading "Being at Last Night’s Game - Welcome Back, Nomar"

I’ve said this many times, but today I need to say it again: What a time to be a Sox fan!  The Sox played a great game of baseball yesterday, beating Seattle 8-4.  Although Lester had a rough fourth inning, the Sox bounced back scoring five runs in the seventh inning which gave us the lead for good. 

But that’s not all that happened yesterday.  Tim Wakefield was named an All Star for the first time in his 17th year as a major league baseball player.  Sure, we’re still happy for Bay, Pedroia, Youkilis, Beckett, and Papelbon.  But it was Wakefield we were all praying for to make the team.  And he did it.  Congrats, Wake!

Good thing the excitement doesn’t end there.  Tonight John Smoltz will be pitching at Fenway for the first time as member of the Boston Red Sox.  I’m sure he will get a hearty hand as his name gets announced at the ballgame tonight.  Maybe tonight we’ll see the Smoltz that we’re hoping to see for the rest of the season. 

Continue reading "Monday Night Baseball at Fenway: Very Exciting"

Ever since I was little, I remember going to Fenway Park and seeing Wakefield pitch.  About five or six years ago, I remember complaining to my friends in high school about how as much as we loved the guy, it felt like he was the pitcher we always saw on the mound.  I haven’t made it to Fenway yet this year, but when I do I personally can’t wait to see him pitch. 

I remember being in elementary schooll watching him warm up in the bullpen.  He was always my favorite to watch warm up because it was so cool to see his knuckleball move.  Sure it’s neat to see it on TV, but it’s awesome standing in the bleachers by the fence and seeing the knuckleball drop the way it does. 

Tonight Wakefield will be starting for the 383rd time in a Red Sox uniform, setting an all time Red Sox record.  He’ll be passing none other than the Rocket himself, Roger Clemens.   Although I never got to see Clemens pitch (except in a Yanks uniform), I know I’m not the only one who’s happy to see such a nice guy setting this record for the Sox.  Years from now, when Wake returns to Fenway Park after being retired for however many years, we’ll be giving him loud standing ovations.  He’s a great team player and a friendly person who is more than modest.  And I couldn’t ask for anything more than to see him pitching in the All Star Game next week.  Best of luck, Timmy, and congratulations.

Continue reading "Growing Up With Wakefield"

I’ll tell you right now that it’s not better than viewing it as any other person. 

I’ll also tell you that even though it’s the summer, we still maintain some of the college atmosphere here in Salem.  A lot of us Salem Staters have off campus apartments so we get to see each other even when school is not in session. 

Personally I was looking forward to watching an entire game on Tuesday night, which is hard to do between multiple jobs and summer classes.  However, I got a text last night before the game started saying that there were going to be some cool people meeting up at Salem Beer Works that night.  I figured I’d go after the game.  So I sat in my room watching the Sox dominate the Os for the first 4 innings.  Thanks to some great offense and a much better start for Smoltz, things seemed to be going our way. 

Continue reading "A College Student’s Perspective of Tuesday’s 11-10 Loss"

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 1st. 

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:

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

I was just looking up news trying to find out if anyone knew how Lowrie was doing and this is what I found out.  Apparently Lowrie had to leave in the fifth inning due to soreness in his knee.   This scared me a bit until I remembered that Lowrie is on the DL for a wrist injury – not a knee injury.  What happened was on Tuesday Lowrie was hit by a pitch in the knee.  It seems as if the eager shortstop might have been pushing a little too hard on the knee, which forced him to leave the game early.  Poor guy.  Hope he gets better soon.  I’m sure he was more than frustrated after leaving the game, but at least the soreness has nothing to do with his wrist. 

In the same article I learned that Jonathan Van Every will be out for the remainder of the Paw Sox season after injuring his left knee as well (that’s ironic).  As much as I feel bad for Lowrie, I feel more bad for Van Every right now.  This guy is 29 years old and still has yet to play more than seven games in the big leagues.  Any injury that keeps you off the field for a year is frustrating, but when you’re fighting to make it to the big leagues and you have to stop because of an injury – well that’s more frustrating.  I’m sure Lowrie feels his frustration, however, seeing as Lowrie has yet to play a full season in the big leagues himself.  It just sucks that Van Every has to be even more patient than he’s already been. 

Continue reading "NESN.com Reports Jed Lowrie Exits Rehab Game With Soreness"