Opening Day optimism

I'm guessing that most of you, like me, are on the redsox.com mailing list, and you also woke up to the above picture in your email.  It's a beautiful photo (and really just makes me want to sneak into Fenway in the early morning with a camera) to start off Opening Day - here's hoping at that time tomorrow the Sox will have kicked off a winning streak.

By chance, I was at the final home game of last season, and like most of September, the day ended in a loss (to the Orioles, no less).  At the time, I wasn't too worried, since there six games still to play and I figured they would clinch soon enough. I won't rehash it now, on the morning of a fresh start, but you all know how that worked out.

I know that there are mixed feelings about the movie Fever Pitch, but there's one scene from it in particular that encompasses how I feel today (and on all Home Openers): the main character's season tickets have arrived, and after he's embraced the delivery guy, he and his friends open the box, touching and smelling and caressing the tickets.  "A new season," says one of them with awe, "a clean slate." The main character smells his sheet of tickets and declares that "this smells like the year."

From all the way in Connecticut, this smells like the year. Soon enough we'll have forgotten this 1-5 start, the bullpen will shake out the kinks, and the field players will find their groove.  Opening Day is about unbridled optimism, and since I won't be able to watch this year (I have to commentate Trinity baseball this afternoon), I'm broadcasting my good feelings now.

I'm predicting Josh Beckett will go out there looking to prove himself after an abysmal start last week in Detroit, and pitch deep into the game.  The lineup will rise to the occasion of performing in front of the Fenway crowd, and those who have been struggling (I'm looking at you Jacoby Ellsbury and Kevin Youkilis) will get in in gear.

Sox take Opening Day, and for my final prediction, Dustin Pedroia goes yard - because that's just what he does on Opening Day.

Johnny Damon headed for the Tribe

 Just some of the photos that come up when you Google "Johnny Damon."

Old friend Johnny Damon has apparently signed with the Cleveland Indians for a one-year deal with "$1.25 million in base salary with $1.4 million," according to ESPN.com.

The Indians are off to a 1-4 start, and though that gives them a better winning percentage than the Red Sox, they have more reason to worry - namely the .176 team batting average and going 1-for-11with runners in scoring position.

The Tribe will be Damon's seventh team, and somehow he's never played in the National League, having played for Kansas City, Oakland, Boston, New York (Yankees), Detroit, and Tampa Bay.  Of course, we know him best as the once fun-loving Idiot who broke our collective hearts when he jumped ship for the Evil Empire after promising that he wouldn't.

He resurfaced in New York without his iconic hair and beard, and had some solid years for the Yankees, winning the World Series with them in 2009.  When he went off to the mid-west in 2010 to play for the Tigers, I for one thought that the healing could begin, but then he vetoed a waiver-trade back to us late in the year, and I decided to never look back.

Johnny Damon is a quality baseball player: he's approaching 3,000 hits, and by all accounts he's a great guy to have in the clubhouse. But I'll never forgive him for shunning us TWICE - and the second time it wasn't even about the money.  So Johnny Damon is becoming an Indian... maybe that's karma?

Ozzie Guillen garners the wrong kind of attention

 If you're not following Ozzie Guillen on Twitter, you should be.

Whatever problems you might already be having with the new manager (and trust me, I understand if you have concerns), you can at least rest assured that it could be much worse. The Red Sox could have gone the route of Marlins owners Jeffrey Loria and David Samson and hired the one and only Ozzie Guillen.

In case you haven't heard, Guillen recently did an interview with Time Magazine, and, as usual, he had some questionable things to say, most infamously, "I love Fidel Castro."

What Guillen was trying to get across is that he admires the Cuban dictator's survival and longevity, not his philosophy of governing, but the intent doesn't matter.  The Marlins are at the beginning of a new era: they just spent huge amounts of money in the offseason for the biggest name free agents (and for Guillen himself), and opened up the season on national television with the unveiling of their new $500 million ballpark in the Little Havana section of Miami.

Yes, that's correct, Little Havana. New manager Ozzie Guillen just announced his love for despised Cuban dictator Fidel Castro in the city with the largest concentration of Cuban refugees in the country, just as the Marlins are trying to recruit them into the fanbase.  It would be like walking into the Upper West Side Jewish Center and announcing to a group of Holocaust survivors that you loved Hitler, then asking them to please support your business.

Needless to say, the fallout has been immediate and messy. Marlins ownership has suspended Guillen for five games for his comments, and the Cuban population in Miami is livid and calling for a termination of Guillen's contract.

It's a safe bet that the Marlins ownership brought Guillen in to garner them some much-needed publicity in a state that is mostly apathetic about baseball.  It's an even safer bet that this was not what they had in mind.

So I understand the frustrations with Bobby V.'s bullpen handling, or the angst about his radio show gig in New York - but at least he hasn't professed his love and admiration for any evil, murderous dictators lately.