All Entries Tagged With: "Boston Red Sox"
Big Papi Comes Up Big in June

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So now that David Ortiz has found his stroke again, all the murmurs will start.
This will certainly mirror the talk that surrounded Jason Giambi a couple of years ago.
You all remember, don’t you? Giambi admitted to doing performance-enhancing drugs before the 2004 season, and followed that up with an 80 game, 12 home run season. The murmurs, in that case, became a roar of laughter.
It didn’t get any better in…
Friday Night Links
It is out of regret that we have to use this section to once again announce the departure of 2 more writers, but we do have 2 additional writing coming on board, but he will not (as of yet) be covering a specific team.
The two gentlemen who will be leaving us are Tony DeMarco who has been writing our Reflections on the Rockies reports just couldn’t keep up writing for his paid…
Amazon VOD “SPACEMAN: A BASEBALL ODYSSEY”

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The Future of the Astros…
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The Lancaster JetHawks are the Astros High-A farm team in the California League. For the last few years, Lancaster was the Red Sox‘ California League team. That changed for 2009 when the Astros changed their affiliation.
Jeff Lasky has been with the JetHawks for what is now his 4th season. As the Director of Broadcasting / Media Relations, Jeff has an everyday perspective on the Astros’ prospects. Let’s get to it:
AC:…
Pirates will remain sellers as deadline approaches
After suffering through 16 consecutive losing seasons, many Pirate fans wonder how any team’s management could be more inept; how any team’s ownership could be more stingy. And who could blame them? The streak of sub-.500 finishes will soon be historic.

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The sudden and unexpected trade of All-Star outfielder Nate McLouth on June 3 was viewed by many as a microcosm of the past decade and…
What’s Wrong With Josh Hamilton?
The Texas Rangers are 30-19 after 49 contests, leading the Angels in the AL West by 5.5 games after play on Saturday. The Rangers’ quick start can be attributed to their potent offense, which ranks fifth in the majors, scoring 5.44 runs per game.
Ian Kinsler, Michael Young and Nelson Cruz have led the way for Texas, combining to hit .303 through the first two months of the season.
I still have hope for the Mariners
Filling in this month with our Reflections on the Mariners is Lori Thompson who helped us out before when she gave us a review of Alyssa Milano’s Touch line of MLB apparel “from a woman’s point of view”. So, without further ado, he’s Lori’s take on her beloved Mariners…
It was tough to lose JJ Putz and Raul Ibanez, but the buzz surrounding new manager Dan Wakamatsu and the return of ‘The Kid’ gave…
Tracking the Top Prospects: Players 1-10

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Back on Jan. 22, Keith Law of Scouts, Inc. wrote a column for ESPN.com that ranked the top 100 prospects in the major leagues for the 2009 regular season. Well, since the most of us do not pay whatever fee that is charged to get ESPNinsider, we only have access to the top 20. So here is a first half list of that Top-20 and tracking what they’ve…
More on hCG and Manny Ramirez
For those of you that read about Manny obtaining hCg from a doctor for a “personal issue”, here’s a thorough article from ESPN on hCG that should be an eye opener.
Here’s an update on Manny’s suspension from the ESPN article:
ESPN.com reported later Thursday that baseball’s drug testing revealed that Ramirez had an elevated level of testosterone from an artificial source in his body, although that is not the reason for…
America’s Pastime: The Last 4 Innings
Sixth Inning
The culmination of a week long bike trip with my Boy Scout troop that encompassed 150 miles was a baseball game on the fourth of July at PNC Park, home of the Pittsburgh Pirates. My dad was not able to accompany us on the biking journey, although he would have loved to, because he had to teach, but he did not miss the game. My baseball knowledge had grown significantly…
Red Sox Reflections After 25 games
After 25 games, the Red Sox found themselves with an 11 game winning streak and neck and neck for first place, with the Blue Jays who have 2 more games in hand than the Sox (both are wins).
During the first few weeks of the season, we have seen the injury bug hit SS Jed Lowrie, SP Daisuke Matsuzaka and OF Rocco Baldeli.
The Rotation
We have also seen great starts be Jon Lester,…
CD Review: Baseball Songs Sports Heroes 2
Assuming their audiences did not get enough in their first two albums, the song writing team of Joe Pickering Jr. and Phil Coley got together once again to put out yet another compilation of baseball related songs. In their 2006 album, Baseball Songs Sports Heroes 2, the duo teams with a few other musicians to bring to light some of baseball’s most talked about subjects. Since…
CD Review: Baseball Songs Sports Heroes
While there are movies and books available for dedicated sports fans, most aren’t familiar with Joe Pickering Jr. and Phil Coley’s collection of CDs on baseball songs. The first in this series is entitled Baseball Songs Sports Heroes: People Who Have Made a Difference. On this album there are everything from songs about individual players to the last days of Fenway Park even to God’s feelings towards some…
Rangers Reflections: The First 3 Weeks
Touch: A Woman’s Point of View
My Touch Obsession
by guest writer Lori Thompson
It started in June 2007. My once yearly trip to a Mariner’s game was going to happen in a couple of months and just didn’t want to wear the same gray/blue men’s baseball shirt that I’d worn the last four years. I was looking for something new. Since I live 4 hours away from the Mariner’s team store, I was…
DVD Review: Fever Pitch

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People may have differing opinions on whether Fever Pitch (Widescreen Edition) is a good movie, but they cannot argue the fact that the producers had to be the luckiest people of all time. What were the chances that they were going to decide to do a movie on a crazed Red Sox fan only to have the “cursed” team win the World Series during the year that the movie was being…
Book Review: The Teammates: A Portrait of Friendship
David Halberstam has become well known for his works about the sport of baseball that add a new perspective to the game which many fans never get a chance to see. Teammates, The: A Portrait of a Friendship is no exception to this rule as it illustrates once again why Halberstam is one of the best at what he does. At the end of the book, Halberstam explains that…
MLB Predictions By the Numbers
The Miller-McCune article by Tom Jacobs that I am referencing today is a mathematical copyrighted model created to predict divisional outcomes in Major League Baseball. The article is entitled, “Baseball’s Best Teams Are…2009 Edition” which you can read in it’s entirety by following the previously provided link.
This model was created by associate professor of mathematical sciences and associate dean of the College of Science and Liberal Arts at the New Jersey Institute of Technology’s Bruce Bukiet,…
Atlanta Braves Looking for Rebound Season in 2009
Following their worst season since Bobby Cox became the manager in 1990, all signs point to the Atlanta Braves returning to their typical spot near the top of the National League East in 2009.
Rather than signing high profile free agents, the Braves have made strategic additions designed to solidify the weaknesses exposed during their 72-90 campaign of a year ago.
The Braves 2009 pitching staff will never be confused with their dominant rotations of…
Book Review: More Tales from the Tribe Dugout
Author Russell Schneider is well known to serious baseball fans around Cleveland from his coverage of the Indians in Cleveland newspapers for so many years. Now a freelance writer, Russell has put together two books of Tales from the Tribe Dugout. In the sequel to his first book, Schneider uncovers some not very well known stories about the Indians from various people who were once in the organization. No one is…
Cincinnati Reds Acquire ProBatter PX2 Pitching Simulators
On March 3, the Cincinnati Reds became the sixth major league club to agree to use what are being called “Flight Simulators” for hitters.
The Reds purchased two of ProBatter Sports’ flagship model PX2 pitching simulators. The model is considered to be the most complex baseball training tool ever invented and does by far the best job of simulating real life batting situations.
Baseball Reflections from South Korea
Spring in Korea means many things, such as polluted air courtesy of China, more people crowding onto the subway, and of course, something one always needs, more vendors selling larva worms as a snack on the street. But there is one thing that spring brings in Korea that is reminiscent of home and that is BASEBALL!
The Korean Baseball Organization (KBO) is made up of nine MLB-comparable teams. Here they are:
A Case for Sabermetrics

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In the past few months I have been gathering monthly author for Baseball Reflections so that I could write on a more relaxed basis and produce more detailed work. This article is the first postto that effect. A version of it was previously posted over at RBI Magazine back on March 12th.
Over the winter people had been wondering if David Ortiz was on the decline given the year he…
Rays Reflections
David Price and Andy Sonnanstine are exhibits A and B in a lesson about how valuable experience can be when making a major league roster or, more importantly, a starting rotation. Though I am a big fan of Andy’s, anyone can see that Price is likely a far more talented pitcher in every aspect of the game. The 23 year old Price seemed major league ready when he was drafted,…




















