Red $ox Should Be Thankful

The baseball Gods have been very kind to the Red Sox. They should have played last Sunday night on national TV against the NY Yankees who had just shamed them into two previous losses; they would have played in front of their former manager, Terry Francona, who would have provided commentary for ESPN but the Gods spared them further humiliation by causing it to rain thereby postponing the game to a future date when maybe just maybe they will be a little more competitive or have gotten another manager fired.

The Gods were also very kind to them in giving them a schedule that took them on the road for the next week thereby taking them out of friendly Fenway that has recently started to hear ‘knowing’ fans boo this assembly of very expensive and badly overpriced group of spoiled players – but what should one expect watching grown men (those that have grown up) playing a kid’s game. The schedule also provides them a break by pitting them against two teams from the Central Division (probably the weakest in baseball) that will provide little competition. The Red Sox with a team salary of $173 million will face the woeful Twins ($94 million) and the White Sox ($96 million). The Twins outside of their two stars Mauer and Morneau who earn a combined $38M (more than a third of their entire player payroll) have twelve players earning close to the league minimum, around $500K.

Compare these twelve from the Twins, who are paid a combined total of approximately $6M to the $17M that’s paid to Josh Beckett, Boston’s prima donna of a pitcher who requires or rather demands his own personal catcher among other things - Beckett is not an everyday player pitching every fifth day and hardly pitches a full nine innings.

This more than favorable 7 game road trip is one where the Sox should come home with a 6 and 1 record, anything short of that will be a failure.

Note: Look at the league leaders in the National League and you will find that Jonathan Papelbon is among the top relief pitchers with six saves (as of today the Red Sox team have a total of six wins). Where does one get a pitcher like that?