(Almost) Truck Day 2013!

Baseball always seems much closer from this side of the Super Bowl.  Red Sox pitchers and catchers report in six days, with their first workout taking place on February 12, in just over a week,  According to the Boston.com's Extra Bases blog, the Globe's Red Sox beat writers are off to Fort Myers TODAY - there are enough players already in attendance to make the early trip worthwhile.

Tomorrow, of course, it will be time for a tradition unique to Boston: Truck Day, when dozens of fans gather on Yawkey Way to watch the team's equipment depart for spring training in the freezing New England weather.  It's the first harbinger of spring in this part of the country, and a quirky but fun way to celebrate the coming of warm nights spent at Fenway Park.

In the last few years, the Red Sox have realized that fans typically turn out of their own accord, and they've made sure to do some fan-outreach, like the attendance of Wally the Green Monster.  There's no info (that I was able to find, at least) on the Red Sox website or Boston.com about this year's event, and  I'm still back and forth about whether I'll head over there.

Have any of you been to Truck Day before? Are any of you planning to be there tomorrow? Is it worth it? Let me know in the comments, on Facebook, or on Twitter!

Move over, Shaughnessy... There's a new cynic in town.

In a shocking new development, the Boston Globe has a bitter cynic working in the sports section. No, I'm not talking about CHB, but [relatively] new blogger Chris Gasper. He wrote a patronizing post the other day about the "farce" that is Truck Day, and even bashes his own paper (among others) for covering it so heavily.

Gasper is biting the hand that feeds him, though I'm sure the Globe won't mind - anything that stirs up controversy and enhances site traffic is just fine by them. Insulting the fans, however, is another matter entirely. Gasper tries to cover his bases by offering up a few cheap compliments:

"Red Sox fans you're better than this. You are the most astute, educated and critical fans in the game. You cheer the outstanding plays of opposing players. You argue endlessly over a manager's decisions, can debate the importance of .OPS vs. UZR and explain why Jose Iglesias has more upside at shortstop than Derrik Gibson."

Personally, I'm tempering my enthusiasm on Iglesias for now... But he sure looks good, doesn't he?

But then he drops the ball quicker than Julio Lugo in the rain (or the sun), and lets us all know how stupid and irrational we're being. Thanks, Chris, but we know that watching a truck leave Fenway Park isn't the most sensible thing to be doing.

But seriously, how can you look at this photo and not smile?

Then again, for many years, rooting for the Red Sox wasn't the most sensible thing to be doing either, and no one at the Globe asked us to stop reading their coverage of the team. I don't know about you, but for me Truck Day is about more than a truck full of bats, balls, exercise bikes, and buckets of Dubble Bubble... Truck Day means baseball is coming. Yes, I know in my heart that baseball will come whether or not I click through the gallery of the Truck Day photos, just as the folks who turn out to oggle Punxsutawney Phil don't really believe that the rodent is predicting the weather.

Gasper was just trying to stir things up, and he succeeded. For his sake, I hope he wasn't always this cynical, though perhaps he spent his childhood disillusioning his peers about the alleged existence of the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus. I've never actually been at Fenway for Truck Day, and don't have any immediate plans to do so... But who does Gasper think he is to judge those who, as he says, "believe the truck isn't just carrying bats and balls it's carrying the hopes and dreams of Red Sox Nation."

He asks us to "Spare him." Next time, Chris, spare me the cynicism and coldhearted analysis... We're in the middle of a New England winter, and things are cold enough.

The Bay Breakup

The Globe (online) has a feature on the front page of their sports page this morning describing the "Worst Sox Breakups." The photo gallery includes players like Johnny Damon, Nomar Garciaparra, Wade Boggs, and, for some inexplicable reason, Jason Bay.

Obviously, I would have liked to keep Jason Bay in Boston, but with all the conversation about his suddenly suspect knees lately, I think the front office made the correct choice. You know the whole story by now: the Sox apparently pulled their 4-year, $60 million deal off the table this summer because of concerns about the left fielders knees, and came back with several offers that contained "medical contingencies." Bay refused those offers, as is his right, and signed with the Mets for 4 years and $66 million, with a club option for a fifth year. Maybe everything didn't work out as planned, but I would hardly call the situation a contentious breakup.

According to this story from WEEI.com's Rob Bradford, posted on Thursday, Bay had several independent physicians examine him, and none found any cause for concern:

"Listen, I could understand the club wanting all these medical contingencies if I had spent any recent time on the DL, but I had no history of being a risk for injuries and I wasn't hurt."

Bay has a valid point, but the Sox medical team saw something, and they've seen things other teams have missed in the past (Hello, Pedro Martinez!). However, unlike most of the other players and coaches in the Globe's gallery, Bay fired no parting shots at the Red Sox, which makes his situation vastly different from, say, Manny Ramirez's. Bay also was diplomatic throughout his year and a half in Boston: though he'd admitted he liked the idea of staying in Boston, he had never promised anything to the fans, a la Johnny Damon.

It seems to me that the Globe might be trying to stir up some drama where none exists. Both Bay and the Red Sox seem ready to move on. The Jason Bay era was short and often sweet: this wasn't a franchise face that was snubbing the Sox, it was a difference in medical opinion, and, if you recall, the Sox medical team was right, and the Mets' wrong, about Martinez a few years back. For now, I stand by the decision to let Jason Bay walk... if he rakes for the next four years without injury (though in cavernous CitiField, that's a BIG "if"), that will be another story.