Quote of the Day

As I'm sure everyone is aware, Selena Roberts was the reporter who first divulged that Alex Rodriguez tested positive for steroids in 2003.  Well, now the enterprising Ms. Roberts has come out with a book alleging that baseball's most highly paid player used as far back as high school, and even while with the Bronx Bombers.

In a story on boston.com's Extra Bases Blog, A*Rod, when asked about the assertions, said "I'm not going there."  Good choice, Alex... but you know what the better choice would have been? Never using in the first place.  Oh, well, that ship sailed years ago.

Asked if he was tired of hearing about steroids, A*Rod said "Ahhh, ya."  I like to imagine that his tone of voice evoked memories of Stephanie from Full House rattling off her trademark quote: "How rude!"

Five Minute Musings

Five quick notes, while I figure out another way to procrastinate.

1.) It's nice to win a game that way, isn't it?  Jonathan Van Every had the game of his life, with not one, but two spectacular catches in the field, and there was that little home run in the top of the ninth that provided the Sox with their margin of victory.  Van Every, interestingly enough, was initially drafted by Cleveland, but never made it further than their Triple-A affiliate, making his major league debut with the Sox last season after he was signed as a minor-league free agent.  Last night's blast was Van Every's first career home run.

2.)  There's a column on weei.com called "Five Things We Learned..." and it recaps the previous night's game (I never miss it, and highly recommend it).  However, in today's column, Rob Bradford seems to be implying that Ellsbury is a good leadoff man because his OBP is seventeenth in the majors... Is it just me, or does "good" seem to mean he's be better than most regular leadoff hitters, not somewhere in the lower-middle?  The other part of the Ellsbury piece talks about how he's becoming affective with two strikes... at least that's something that bodes well for a leadoff hitter.  Seventeenth out of thirty? Seriously?

3.) The sun [won't] come out, tomorrow (or today, or all weekend).  That's right, the Red Sox are headed to Tampa for a four-game series with the floundering Rays in that godawful dome.  The Rays are back to their once-familiar place a the bottom of the American League East with an 8-14 record, having just lost a series to the Minnesota Twins.  Thus far, the Rays have lost to the Sox (1), Baltimore (2), New York (2), Chicago (3), Seattle (2), Oakland (2), and Minnesota (2).  Only five of these losses have come at home however, where the Rays enjoyed a .704 winning percentage last year... it should be a good series.

4.) Who would have thought that, 20+ games into the season, the AL East would look like it does.  Boston on top? Check.  New York in third? Understandable.  Baltimore in fourth? Yep.  But... the Rays last? Toronto in second? Huh?  Toronto, we all decided during the offseason, couldn't compete; the only good piece they had was Roy Halladay, and he can only take the ball every fifth day.  The Rays hadn't lost anyone terribly important, and had even added a true cleanup man in Pat Burrell... Well, that's the beauty of baseball: the games aren't played on paper, becasue if they were, everyone would concede to the Yankees, every year.

5.) This: 

Allegedly, A*Roid did take steroids while in the Bronx, and even as early as high school... Tsk, Tsk, Alex, can't you ever stay out of the papers??

In defense of Javier Lopez

There's absolutely no excuse for botching the play the way Lopez did last night in the bottom of the ninth.  I mean, I know second string Little Leaguers that would have caught that feed from Youkilis.  However, that game was not lost solely on a fielding error by the unfortunate Mr. Lopez.

Remember the third inning, when Lugo got a nearly perfect throw from Youkilis while covering second, and a clean catch would probably have meant an inning ending double play?  Well, E6 dropped it, and instead of being out of the inning, Ben Francisco took Sox starter Brad Penny deep for a three-run homer.  Alright, so Julio just needs to shake the cobwebs off, right? He can't be that bad... but wait.  

Lugo, seemingly determined to make Sox fans forget the two hits he notched last night, made a nearly unforgivable mistake: he ignored a center fielder calling for the ball.  The rules of fly ball catching are simple: the shortstop has priority over the infielders, the center fielder over the other outfielders, and the center fielder over the shortstop.  Lugo, perhaps thinking that a spectacular running catch in short center field would endear him to the fans who have previously disparaged his performance, ran out into Jacoby Ellsbury's territory and tried to make the play.  Now, had he made the catch, it wouldn't matter, but he didn't.  Instead, Ellsbury goes into a slide, seemingly hoping to avoid a collision with Lugo, and Lugo, of course, misses the ball, which bounces off Ellsbury and into left field... I'm just assuming the inimitable Jason Bay returned it to the infield, because I was too busy screaming profanities at my television to notice.

Lugo had this to say: "It's going to take me a little while to get back.  I'm not 100 percent right now. I haven't played for a long time, and I'm going to be off a little bit. I don't have my skills put together. It's going to take me a little while to get back in playing shape and for my knee to feel good and be 100 percent."  Oh, okay.  But if Lugo's not 100%, what is he doing back with the big club? Isn't the purpose of a rehab assignment to get the player back to his full potential!?!? Whew. Deep breaths...

Not that this was a one man show: the Sox made other errors last night, including one on a throw from Mike Lowell, usually an exemplary fielder, throwing over Pedroia's head (cue the "Pedroia is short" joke).  Penny gave up seven runs in 2 2/3 innings, though only four were earned.  

Obviously, Lopez's drop of the Kevin Youkilis feed that would have meant extra innings was the most visible sign of defeat, since, technically, it was the play during which the winning run was scored.  However, it's important to remember that even if Lopez had made the play, there's no guarantee that the Sox would have won in the extra frames.  I'm a bit of a Lopez apologist, and I'll admit that it's partially because he generally seems like such a good guy (also, slightly hilarious, see his comments in this video).  But I genuinely believe that Lopez has something to offer this team: at this time last year, Sox fans were doubting the effectiveness of Manny Delcarmen, and to this point this season, MDC has not surrendered an earned run.  I have faith that Lopez will pick it up, and really, he pitched a scoreless ninth, except for his own error that allowed an unearned run.

An unfortunate way to end the eleven game winning streak, to be sure, but in the wise words of Kevin Youkilis, "You don't like losing, but we're playing good ball.  There's too many games to sit around and mope.  Just go home, get some rest, and get back at it again." And really, if anyone has the right to dismiss this loss, it's the man who had two of his throws turned into errors instead of outs.

I imagine his thoughts as this picture was taken closely mirror the words we see Pedroia use after he strikes out... But that's just a guess.