Stress case

Lots of fingernails in the gutters on Boylston this morning. Xanax prescriptions up 52 percent from a week ago.

It’s not 1978, so let’s get that ugly reminiscence out of the way. The Red Sox never had a 14 1/2 game lead over their rivals this year as they did 27 summers ago. Still, the parallel today is too eerie to ignore.

The lead in the East is now 1 1/2 games, in case you hadn’t noticed or just simply chose to ignore after the Yanks came back to beat Tampa last night as the Sox were getting stymied by another pitcher they hardly knew. For all the advance research this franchise does, how does it consistently have trouble against hurlers the lineup has never faced? If I’m facing these guys in the playoffs, I pick three dudes out of the beer line that night, suit them up and send them to the hill. Manny and company will have no idea what hit them.

By tomorrow night, the Yankees could overtake the division, and Red Sox Nation will be left wondering who to blame. Let’s get this straight. It could be the East or bust for the Sox in 2005, with such a muddled wild card race, one that could include the White Sox before all is said and done.

With the Cleveland Indians making a charge at the AL Central now, it’s not inconceivable that they could catch the wall-hitting White Sox, and drop Ozzie and Friends into the wild card chase. It’s possible at the same time that the Red Sox might drop out of first and into the pool as well with the likes of Oakland and/or Los Angeles.

If Boston fails to hold onto first place, it will mean battling as many as four other teams for the wild card, certainly not an enviable proposition over the final two weeks for a team that has held a stranglehold on first place ever since the middle of summer.

The magic number for the Red Sox remains hovering at 16, just two games less than it was on Monday. In essence, this weekend against the A’s is what we should dub an extra round of the playoffs, as either the Sox or A’s could either make life a whole lot more difficult or even knock the other team out of contention with a sweep.

Here is what is most concerning, though: those three final games at home against the Yankees. It’s going to come down to those, no matter how much we want to deny it, how much we want the certain emotional energy spent over those three days not to have to come to fruition. One team will take over for good during that weekend, barring a tie and one-game playoff in the Bronx the next day (do they not realize some of us have U2 tix for that night?). No longer is the American League a situation where the second-place team in the East simply gets the wild card as it was the last two seasons. If Boston were in the wild card driver’s seat right now, their 85-61 mark would have them just a game up on the Indians.

The loser of the West won’t likely be a factor, at least as things stand now. LA and Oakland, at 81-65, each would be four games in back of Boston right now. Cleveland and Chicago both pose the greatest problems for the Red Sox’ potential wild card situation, something nobody wants to speak of just yet. It would mean opening the ALDS in one of those Central cities, depending who takes it, instead of with the first two at home, something they have not had the benefit of doing since 1990.

In many ways, Red Sox fans would be smart to root for the White Sox to hang onto the division, even though Boston has been within striking distance of the league’s best record for some time now.

The Yankees are 8-5 in September, the Red Sox are 8-7. Cleveland, meanwhile, is 10-3, while the White Sox are 8-6. The Angels are 7-7, and the A’s are 6-8.

Get the picture? There really is one truly scary September team out there right now, and it’s Cleveland. The Indians play last-place Kansas City seven times over the next two weeks, furthering the prevalent thought that they’re going to run away with the wild card. The Yankees may be creeping up on the Red Sox, but they’re not exactly prepping for the all-out charge either.

It will come down to that final weekend unfortunately, leaving Red Sox Nation spent and emotionally exhausted just in time for another postseason. And even if the Red Sox emerge triumphant, it doesn’t leave a whole lot of time to set up an already questionable pitching staff. That is a concern for another day of course. For now, the Red Sox are in first place, and the Yankees are the ones chasing them, not the other way around as you might imagine by witnessing some of the faces walking on the wharf, debating whether or not to dive in. Despite some road bumps, it is still a smooth ride here in the middle of …

Eh, never mind. Pass the Xanax.

Mail bagging it

Every point you make about Ortiz being named MVP is not only valid, but I believe airtight as well. The most compelling perhaps being the fact that the Eck, Clemens and Fingers having won the award. Not only were those guys “half a player” as Verducci puts it, but only played in a fraction of the games Big Papi does as DH. Kinda makes them more like, um, a quarter player, doesn’t it?
Mike Abernante

Plus Rollie Fingers pitched just 78 innings when he won the award in 1981, and Eckersley pitched just 80. I will say this though, I am deeply within the camp that Mariano Rivera could, and should, take home a league MVP award, since by the very definition of the hardware, he is the most VALUABLE. Are the Yankees anywhere near what they have been the last decade without Rivera? No, period. And yet, he’s not considered the best player on the team by any stretch. But he alone defines what is taken so out of context with the award in that home runs and RBIs seem to weild too much power. We hear Johnny Damon’s name mentioned, but is he a serious candidate? I doubt it. And yet perhaps no other player on the Sox fuels the lineup so consistently on a nightly basis. They go as he goes.

While I do believe that David Ortiz warrants serious consideration for the MVP award, I would like to remind you that Barry Bonds is considered by many to be the greatest defensive left fielder of all time and Frank Thomas was known for his excellent play at first base when he won his MVPs. Both players obviously became liabilities in the field as they got older, who can forget the time Bonds watched the ball fly overhead thinking it was a homerun only to have it bounce off the wall, but it is patently unfair to say that either player was a poor fielder while winning MVPs when, in fact, that is not entirely true.
Brandon Pinney

OK then. Jose Canseco.

Great article. I love how you can compare and even favor a player like Ortiz over the best player in baseball.

Love it.

Now Ortiz is the next Barry Bonds or something. Is that what you want the fans of Boston to believe? Do you wonder how it’s so easy to laugh in the face of that kind of logic? RSN cant even think for themselves, they just latch on to whatever you are feeding them at the time.

Love A-rod, hate A-rod.
Love Nomar, hate Nomar
Love MO, hate Mo
Love Clemens, hate Clemens.

Can’t wait for the next article though. Keep up the good work. Maybe a piece comparing Foulke’s numbers to Rivera? How about Renteria to Jeter? No? Didn’t think so.
Joey Zaza

Damon to Williams? How about Ramirez to Matsui? Maybe Varitek to Posada? No? Didn’t think so.

No one is making Ortiz the next Bonds, so I’m not really sure where you got that one. But God forbid he should be favored over the best player in baseball, right? A-Rod deserves that claim, no question, but by my recollection, he’s only won one MVP award. So per your argument, he should simply win it every year, right?

2 points to start out this email:

1. I live in Boston but I’m a Yankee fan
2. David Ortiz (as of Sept 15) is the 2005 MVP

Ortiz and ARod have similar batting stats except for when there are RISP. Ortiz is well ahead in average, and slugging with RISP.

However, one point that hasn’t been raised about Ortiz only being a DH–this is forcing the Sox to play Kevin Millar!! I think the negative impact of having to play Millar at 1st should be weighed against Ortiz. And let’s be perfectly honest, its not like Millar’s stellar defense is keeping Ortiz on the bench. As bad as Millar is at 1st (and he is bad, no range and zero ability to pick semi poorly thrown balls to him), Ortiz is just as bad if not worse. Ortiz is still the MVP (until Millar blows a crucial game by going 0-4 and causing two errors with his lack of range and his lack of picking balls). I’d love to see the pro Ortiz media admit that his inability to play defense is in fact hurting the Sox on a daily basis. Next time Millar steps in the bucket on an outside corner pitch and strikes out, again, thank Big Papi for that.
Brian Beisel

What if Olerud plays? Should he get those points back?

Nobody’s going to argue that Ortiz is stellar over at first, but let’s not forget he wasn’t all that bad in the World Series games in St. Louis either. Yes, that’s just a two-game sampling, but he did provide the heads-up play to nab Jeff Suppan at third in Game 3. Granted, Suppan was so far off the bag a pumpkin pie could have picked him off, but Ortiz didn’t prove to be a liability out there either. That being said, I’ve witnessed him take grounders since then, and let’s just say it won’t be until Game 3 of the Fall Classic that we’ll see him out there again.

You know what – when Foulke leaves – why not take responsibility along with the rest of the media for riding out of town a guy who should be a friggin’ legend in this town forever. Instead, you, along with the rest of the print and on-air media, will probably hide behind the “Media has no effect on people or actions – we just report the news” mantra, which is how most of the group spins it each time this happens.

What a shame. Thanks a lot.
Jeff

Amazing. Nobody is trying to ride Foulke out of town, he’s doing just fine on that by himself thank you very much. I understand it’s convenient to blame the media for anything. You think the Red Sox are happy about Foulke’s performance this season, or any of his cantankerous comments all season long? From talking for trucks to Burger King to claiming it’s not about the team’s confidence, it’s about him. The part you don’t understand is that if Foulke were struggling and trying to find himself, I wouldn’t have a problem with him. I truly wouldn’t. But he says the stupidest, most ignorant things when he opens his mouth, and is open for criticism.

Interesting article about Foulke not making the playoff roster. My only comment is that last year at this time I thought that Derek Lowe should have been left off of the playoff roster (as you may recall, he had a horrific September, maybe longer), and it turned out that he pitched admirably in the post season. So, one never knows, does one. By the way, I equate Lowe with Foulke as two pitchers who are not really as good as their press would indicate (I remember Foulke’s performance, or lack thereof, against the Sox in the 2003 Divisional Series, and I am not surprised by his lack of performance now), although they have had spurts of brilliance.
Paul Alpert

Foulke and Lowe, the Coldplays of baseball?

I just read your blog and wanted to make a correction. What Damon said on ESPN radio (I was listening that day) was that if the playoffs were beginning right now (prior to Saturday) he would start Wakefield, Wells and either Clement of Arroyo in that order. When asked about his omission of Schilling, Damon replied “you asked me who I’d start right now”. Damon went on to say that he expected Schilling to improve and that by the time the playoffs actually begin three weeks from now that he expected Schilling to be either the number 1 or 2 starter. After the interview the ESPN host tried to make a big deal out of Damon slighting Schilling by leaving out the second half of his answer . I didn’t see it as that big a deal, Damon answered the same way that I would have.
Steve Craven

Duly noted, but Schilling had been in the rotation for a few weeks at that point already, and yet Damon wasn’t willing to commit. Shows more than a little bit of a lack of faith in the ace, no? And let’s not forget Damon was the pied piper back in July airing reasons as to why Schilling shouldn’t have been the closer. There appears to be some measure of tension there.

Eric what’s the dealio with Larry Lucchino and Tom Warner giving the “Best clutch hitter in Sox History” Plaque to Big Papi during the heat of a pennant race? Come on guys grow a brain!! What’s that old phrase about every action having an equal but opposite reaction? Well times this one by 2 you geniuses because now you gotta fold Manny and his delicate psyche into the equation as well. I mean, come on, not only does this ill timed trophy-giving have the potential to make the Big 3-4 think twice when again he finds himself in the Bronx on a lovely October evening, staring down the barrel of a shotgun named Mariano with the bags juiced and 1 down in the top of the 9th, but even worse, after HE whiffs and the Taciturn Twenty-Four stands in for his hacks, instead of focusing in on the nastiest cutter in baseball history, he’ll still be pining over the fact that it’s Papi’s name and not his gracing the front of Larry and Tom’s Pandora’s Plaque.

Perhaps a private ceremony down in the DR in the off season with Papi, Tom, Larry and maybe a portrait of the Splendid Splinter thrown in for kicks, would have been a better idea. The public ‘awarding’ of this plaque before the end of the season is like a manager standing on the mound in the late innings of what could be a World Series clinching game and handing his departing pitcher the ‘game ball’ thinking all the while his team has nothing more to do except pop a few champagne corks and grab the trophy from the commish. I mean, honestly, you wouldn’t want to do anything to fire up the other team would you? God forbid- they might make a come back….
Robert P, San Francisco

Yeah, the whole presentation thing was kind of strange wasn’t it? I don’t really think it will have an adverse effect on Manny, but you have to think other teams around the league were snickering at the whole thing.

Mr. Wilbur,

I was reading your blog about the Patriots and I wanted to make a comment about the new iPod. Nano is a prefix used in measurement. For example, a nanometer is a millionth of a centimeter. The phrase “nanu, nanu” was gibberish from Mork and Mindy.
Kevin

Um. Thanks.