Jim Rice is a genetic freak.

Now that Jim Rice is a permanent fixture on NESN's Red Sox Post-Game Show, we get to hear his take on hitting, fielding, and everything in between daily. Obviously, Jim Rice was an amazing ballplayer with a Hall of Fame plaque to prove it, but he's also quite the character.

Rice named The Young and the Restless as his favorite soap opera during his Hall of Fame induction speech last summer, something most men wouldn't be to keen to admit. I'll make no secret of my affection for Jim Rice: though his playing days ended just before I was born, his presence in Red Sox lore transcends generations.

That said, I disagree with some of the things he preaches, both as a hitting coach, and a commentator. In Moneyball Rice is described as ridiculing Scott Hatteburg for his patience at the plate, endorsing the [then] Red Sox idea that a walk with a man on base was selfish, that your duty was to hit the ball. Said Hatteburg: "Jim Rice hit like a genetic freak and he wanted everyone else to hit the way he did."

Of course, it makes sense that a hitting coach would have high expectations of his players, but it's absolutely insane to imagine any of them could replicate Rice. One of my only pet peeves with Rice is that he severely undervalues on-base percentage. He's said numerous times that walks are overrated. I beg to differ. First of all, a walk requires that the pitcher has thrown at least four pitches, while a hit requires just one. Making the opposing pitcher work harder is NEVER a bad thing, and a walk ensures that.

Also, a walk is JUST AS VALUABLE as a hit, as each one (a) avoids an out and (b) puts you on first base. This is all old news, but I just can't get over Jim Rice's cavalier attitude toward the base on balls.

Otherwise? I love him to death. Long live Jim Ed!

The New Moneyball

"The new Moneyball player looks a lot like Boston's new centerfielder: fast, athletic, a slick fielder who even at age 37 and for $8 million a year is a bargain. 'Mike Cameron played on two of the 10 best defensive teams of all time [the 2001 Marlins and the 1999 Reds],' says [Tony] Blengino. 'Every team he's played for has gotten better. Every team he's left collapsed when he left. No, Mike Cameron's not a Hall of Famer. But he's clearly a winning baseball player.'" -p. 67, Sports Illustrated (March 1, 2010)


Hello skeptics! I know you're out there: you Red Sox fans who scoff at Theo's newfound love for run prevention and predict a downfall of epic proportions. I disagree with you. The players disagree with you. The front office (obviously) disagrees with you. But I know that won't sway you, so maybe this will: Sports Illustrated recently ran a six page article [in the Olympic issue, no less!] on the "new Moneyball," which, in case you were wondering, is defense and run prevention.

I'm guessing there's a lot of overlap in the "doubt Theo" and "Moneyball is all about OBP and Billy Beane is a failure" demographics, so before I start, I'm going to make some clarifications. Moneyball was not about OBP, but rather the exploitation of undervalued commodities within baseball. In the early days of the last decade, OBP was all but ignored, and so those who paid attention to it (Hey there, Billy Beane) reaped the benefits. Now, of course, on base percentage is quoted just as often as the old standby, the batting average, and it's displayed on scoreboards and television screens across the country. OBP is no longer undervalued by the market, and so teams looking for an edge no longer prioritize it as the Holy Grail of statistics.

According to SI's Albert Chen, defense is the new byword, and the movement is being spearheaded by the Seattle Mariners, who, despite scoring fewer runs than anyone in the American League, won 85 games last year, overcoming a pitching staff that essentially boasted Felix Hernandez and no one else. These same Mariners went 4-2 against your very own Boston Red Sox, on the back of a defense and run prevention strategy.


Theo's not stupid. He saw what we all saw: a stacked lineup (and bottomless pockets) to the south, and a team out west with a small payroll but good results. He put two and two together, added Cameron, Adrian Beltre, and Marco Scutaro, and as a result, Sox fans are about to be treated to a parade of defensive gems from April to [hopefully] sometime in October. This offense will be just fine, and the defense promises to be one of the best New England has seen. Let's all just take a deep breath and relax... and if you really feel the need to worry about something, I suggest you fret over the state of Beltre's balls.