2014 Hall of Fame - Part III - Ballot Time

In my previous posts, I reviewed the former Red Sox on the ballot and my thoughts on them, as well as my thoughts on players of interest to Canadians.

To recap, I had said the following eight players would get a checkmark on my ballot:

• Jeff Bagwell
• Edgar Martinez
• Fred McGriff
• Tim Raines
• Curt Schilling
• Lee Smith
• Frank Thomas
• Larry Walker

This leaves two open spots.   Players who I hadn't reviewed in these previous posts include Craig Biggio, Barry Bonds, Tom Glavine, Luis Gonzalez, Greg Maddux, Mike Mussina, Mike Piazza, Alan Trammell and others who in a less crowded ballot might get some serious consideration.

I'm going to have to get some liquid paper and erase some of the checkmarks off of my in progress ballot. My ballot will need room for Barry Bonds, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux and Craig Biggio.  Lee Smith and Fred McGriff will need to come out.  I feel awful that I don't have room for Alan Trammell.

My final ballot:

1. Jeff Bagwell
2. Craig Biggio
3. Barry Bonds
4. Tom Glavine
5. Greg Maddux
6. Edgar Martinez
7. Tim Raines
8. Curt Schilling
9. Frank Thomas
10. Larry Walker

For some more reading, you can take a look at The Hall of Nearly Great to read some great stories about several players that are not in Cooperstown.  This book has a compilation of some excellent writers talking about players who have not been elected, including some Red Sox favorites such as Luis Tiant, Dwight Evans and Ellis Burks.

Now pinch-running, #93....

... followed by awkward silence. Yes, the announcer at JetBlue Park also had no idea who the gentleman wearing a Red Sox #93 jersey was. This is one of many things you see in a spring training game that you don't see in meaningful games. To be fair to Kevin Millar's brother, Jensen, who served as the public address announcer this afternoon, I also had no idea who #93 is.  And I may not have a cool brother who was a key part of the first Red Sox Championship since World War I, but I'm fairly confident in my ability to name most Red Sox by sight.  And I don't just mean the starting 9 or just the ones on the 40 men roster, but most players in the high minors and key prospects at lower levels.

Still... when a player enters the game and is going to officially appear in a boxscore, you would think someone in the pressbox would have a cheat sheet with a list of names and numbers. This was only one of many moments that gave fans a chuckle at today's game.  Anyhow, I have confirmed that this was Portland centerfielder Shannon Wilkerson.

Other light moments from the game:

Notes from Red Sox Spring Training trip

Here's a review of day 1:

4:15 AM - depart home to go to Calgary airport.  For those of you that know me, you know how major of a commitment it is for me to get out of bed before 8 AM.  Very few things get me up before dawn. Baseball is on that shortlist. (Very short. It has exactly one item on it).

7:00 AM - Flight departs towards DFW (Dallas) where I'll catch a connection to RSW (Fort Myers)

6:00 PM - We arrive at RSW, after a pair of uneventful flights.
7:00 PM - after getting luggage and rental car check in at the hotel.

I check my phone, and see on my twitter feed that the Red Sox have an exhibition game against Puerto Rico's WBC team starting in 5 minutes.  Fenway South is about a 5 minute drive away.  Is the game sold out, will I be able to buy tix from a scalper?  I'm tired and hungry, but only one way to find out.

We head towards the game, and quickly buy a pair and make our way to our seats.  I'm going to be in Fort Myers less than 48 hours in total, but will get to watch the Red Sox play three times.  As Macklemore would say "This is ***ing Awesome!"

More Red Sox - Alberta connections

Ruben Lipszyc / BMC

If you're a semi-regular reader of this blog, you know I frequently mention Canadian associations to the Red Sox.  Whether it's Jason Bay scoring a playoff series winning run, Eric Gagne closing out a Series win, or Kevin Youkilis hitting his first career home run in Toronto, there have been many Canadian connections to the Red Sox recently.  But connections specific to Alberta are a bit rarer.  Calgarian Chris Reitsma  was drafted in the 1st round, and a couple of years ago, the Sox drafted another player who played High School ball in the province, but otherwise there hasn't been a lot linking the Red Sox directly to Alberta.

But the other day as I was flipping through some old baseball cards, I came across a Kevin Millar and a Ryan Dempster (left) card in Calgary Cannons uniforms.  So that got me thinking, what other Red Sox (players and coaches) called Alberta home on the way to The Show (or were sent down after a playing in the Bigs)?  I did some quick research and came up with a fairly lengthy list.  From all-stars who were integral part of Red Sox teams, to part time players, who just made a brief stop in Fenway. My research was not exhaustive so I may have missed someone, and if so, please let me know in the comments below and I'll amend the post.

Without further ado, here is the list of former (and current!) Red Sox who played in Alberta.  I counted over 75 players including a Hall of Famer and several all-stars, and that's without any of these teams being affiliated to us!

Calgary Cannons (AAA - Pacific Coast League)
Mike Lowell
Kevin Millar
Ryan Dempster

Three Top Red Sox Players In Fantasy

As the baseball season nears, fans are starting to think about Fantasy Leagues.  Below is a guest article which focuses on Fantasy Baseball Red Sox players:



Most people outside of Boston might be down on the Red Sox in 2013, but there is plenty of talent still in Beantown. Fantasy owners will be eyeing a number of their every day players and pitchers, even if they lack that first or second round star. Here’s a look at when the right time is for a person to take three of their top players.

Dustin Pedroia
The second baseman for the Red Sox has been a steady producer for quite some time, so it is no surprise that he is the top fantasy baseball player heading into 2013. Last season, he posted solid overall numbers of 15 home runs, 65 RBI and 20 stolen bases to go with a .290 average. If he can stay healthy for an entire season, those numbers can go up even more. He is a top 30 overall fantasy baseball player heading into the year, and only Robinson Cano is better amongst second basemen.

Jacoby Ellsbury
When the outfielder is healthy, few provide the type of overall value Jacoby Ellsbury does. What hurts him is that he plays a loaded position where his numbers do not stand out as much. His numbers are pretty insignificant to talk about in 2013 since he missed so much time, but his 14 steals in limited action shows that his wheels are still there. He might be a bit of a risk, but he will probably last until the 35th-40th overall pick in most drafts. Amongst outfielders, he is in the 10th to 15th range.

Jon Lester
A guy who went 9-14 with a 4.82 ERA in 2012 might not seem like much of a reliable fantasy pitcher, but his track record and lack of other options make him the best pick out of the Red Sox. The left-hander had a terrible season by his standards last year, but at 29 years old, most of it could be corrected. Wins are out of his control to a degree, but when an ERA is near five, there is not much that can be done. He still strikes out enough guys that he will make a solid 4th or 5th starter on most fantasy squads.

Another Canadian joins the Red Sox

(Greg M. Cooper / USA TODAY Sports)

British Columbia native Ryan Dempster has been signed by the Red Sox for the next two seasons. Dempster will join a long list of Canadians who have been part of the Crimson Hose in recent memory.  These include Jason Bay, Matt Stairs, Eric Gagne, George Kottaras, Adam Stern, Mike Gardiner, Erik Bedard and Chris Reitsma who was drafted in the 1st round but never played home games at Fenway.

Being Canadian myself, I usually want the Red Sox to acquire as many Canucks as possible. However, I was less then overly enthusiastic when I heard Dempster's name linked to the Red Sox.  With other free agent starting pitchers available, I did not think he was the best choice. What I knew about him, was that he has played most of his career in the National League and that his brief stint in Texas last year resulted in an ERA north of 5. And not being a fastball pitcher, we all know that when pitchers move from the NL to the AL, they get exposed as they can't dominate our hitters like they could in the National League.  Oh year, he's not getting any younger.  Sigh.  But thanks to the good folks at the Sons of Sam Horn, a bunch of very positive points have emerged about this signing:

Take a look at the 2 lines of nearly identical stats below over the past 3 seasons:.

The Mayans were right!

Could it get any worse?  Jon Lester doesn't give up a run through 6 2/3 innings. Ryan Sweeney gets a 2 out game tying triple in the 9th against last year's majors saves leader, and we still lose?
Yes, it can!
The two best pitchers we have that aren't on the DL or in the starting rotation combined to give up 3 hits, hit one batter and allow the winning run to score while only recording a single out in the bottom of the 9th.

2012 Red Sox optimism

I am very excited about the upcoming season for the Red Sox.  Even more so than last year, and I think I may be in the minority.  (Although, not alone, as you can see from the responses of the other bloggers to share their opinions on the upcoming season at the Cardinal70 at bat blog.)

The main things fans seemed to be concerned about in the offseason were the change in management with the associated lack of making a big splash in the free agent market which has led to perceived shortcomings at starting pitching,  shortstop, corner outfielders and closer positions.  Let me address each of these and demonstrate why I don't believe any of these are legitimate concerns.

Management
Fans clamored their disappointment that we ran "THE GREATEST GM IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD" and the "MOST BELOVED MANAGER EVAH" out of town.  No argument from me here.  However, let's not overestimate the impact that these positions have on the results on the field.  Theo Epstein was the genius wonderboy who made all the right moves to bring a championship to Boston after 86 long years.  But if Dave Roberts doesn't beat the throw to second, Theo becomes the man who traded Nomar for
some spare parts and would probably need to wear a bullet proof vest the rest of his life, lest he run into some angry members of Red Sox Nation.  He did made some great acquisitions - picking up Bill Mueller, David Ortiz and Bronson Arroyo from the scrap heap, signing Foulke and Schilling, but he also spent a lot of money and/or traded some good prospects for the likes of Brad Penny, John Smoltz, Eric Gagne, Wily Mo Pena, and many others who weren't large contributors.  And let's not forget Julio Lugo, Edgar Renteria or the panic re-acquisition of Doug Mirabelli.  I'm giving him a pass on Lackey and Crawford for at least few more years.   Anyhow, Dan Duquette brought us Pedro Martinez, Derek Lowe and Jason Varitek, and he doesn't get much credit because the team didn't win under his watch.  In summary, I think Theo was (is?) a good GM, but Ben Cherington learned under his watch, and the impact of the GM change is negligible.

5 Random Red Sox Questions

Ever year, C70 at the Bat which is an excellent baseball blog, mainly about the World Series champion St.Louis Cardinals, gets a feel for other teams around baseball by asking bloggers of those teams a few questions about their squad. This year, I was asked and answered the following questions about our Red Sox. Take a look at C70 at the Bat to see how other Baseball Bloggers Alliance members answered.



1) What was your opinion of the team’s offseason?
I may be the only Red Sox fan to say I was pleasantly surprised. They did not panic and overcommit money to players that they don't or won't need.  This year's team isn't vastly different from last year and they didn't mortgage the future with deals that would handcuff them in future years. After "THE COLLAPSE" it's easy to forget that for 4½ months this was by far the best team in all of baseball.
The top 3 pitchers in the rotation are back, and Buchholz didn't pitch after the middle of June, so the top of the rotation can potentially improve. There's been a lot of talk about not improving the #4 and 5 slots. Despite many rumours, Boston did not sign Oswalt, Kuroda or Edwin Jackson or make a bid on Yu Darvish, or trade for John Danks. But last year Lackey pitched all season with an ERA well above 6. DiceK while healthy contributed an ERA over 5. Wakefield had the 4th most starts on the team, and his ERA was North of 5 as well. Andrew Miller started 12 games and had an even higher ERA. And please don't get me started on Kyle Weiland who would have made any of the above look like Cy Young in comparison. That's a total of 75 games started with a combined ERA of approximately 5.8. I believe that Bard, Aceves and any others that need to fill in due to the inevitable injuries such as Cook, Padilla, Duckworth, Silva, Ohlendorf etc, can'd do any worse. I really see the starting rotation as being a large improvement over last year. Replacing Papelbon with Bailey and Melancon was a very smart move. On the field it may be a slight downgrade, but it never makes sense to overpay for relievers - particularly closers.
On the other side of the ball, the biggest change has been in right field and shortstop. Boston's rightfielders offensively were the worst in baseball. They lost JD Drew and Reddick who were a major part of the position that hit a combined .233. Rumors of signing Carlos Beltran (thankfully) didn't materialize. Instead we now have some combination of Ryan Sweeney, Cody Ross and Darnell McDonald. DMac is an excellent platoon player, who hit .260 against lefties while being on pace to knock 25 balls out of park, if he faced southpaws everyday. Hopefully he'll have an opportunity to be used more, at least against wronghanders. Again, I can't envision any scenario where this position will be worse than last year. At shortstop, we lost Jed Lowrie, who had some early season heroics and was at least a good platoon hitter (a .214 career average against righties isn't going to win you a lot of starting jobs at any position). But he had some defensive "challenges" at short. Losing Marco Scutaro was slightly more troublesome. I hope Mike Aviles can handle the position. I really don't want to see Nick Punto starting any more than necessary. However, this team scored the most runs in the majors last year, out pacing the World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals by over 100 runs. If Jose Iglesias turns out to be the only player than can field a ground ball at the position, he can go 0-500 on the season, and this team can still win.

Thank you Toronto!

As I mentioned earlier, good things happen when we play the Blue Jays.  Not only are we now on a 3 game winning streak (after having only 2 wins in the first 11 games), but some individual players have broken out too.  Most importantly, was Dice-K going from being on the edge of Sayonara, to looking like a Cy Young candidate with his 7 IP, 0R, 1 BB, 1 H performance today.  As well, even though Youks had been getting on base, he wasn't showing any power, and a couple of home runs against the Jays has hopefully helped him break out of his hitting slump.  Jed Lowrie is hitting the ball like an MVP candidate, instead of a backup middle infielder.

Don't listen to David Lee Roth

I hear that there is a long wait time on the Tobin Bridge (if you're in Boston), and if you are in my home province, well, good luck finding a bridge. We're sort of landlocked here.

And besides, the Blue Jays coming to town is just what the doctor ordered!

On straws, camels, and assigning blame to a loss

Last week, after a 1-0 loss to the Indians,  I heard a few fans complaining that we lost the game because of Darnell McDonald's baserunning blunder.   Others blamed the umpire for calling him out when he was "clearly" safe.  My friend Reg, over at his Rulebook Guru's Blog has more to say about why blaming an umpire for a loss is never very astute.  But I want to touch on why blaming one player, or one play is also a sign that you probably should be watching hockey instead, because baseball is obviously way too complicated for you.

Red Sox Nation Alberta - Watch Party

To all Red Sox fans in Alberta...

Our very own Marc David of Calgary has been named Acting RSN Lieutenant-Governor of Alberta. He has set up a Red Sox Nation Alberta Facebook group which I encourage all fans to follow.

There will be occasional events posted there. The first one is a Blue Jays vs. Red Sox watch party at the Melrose cafe in Calgary. This will be the VERY FIRST Red Sox Nation INTERNATIONAL EVENT!!! Come on out and be a part of it.

For more info you can contact Marc David directly at abgov@redsoxnation.com

(By the way... reminder to any facebook users to also "like" this blog's facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/RSN-Alberta-Blog/203620509651224

MUST WIN GAME!

I just did the math.  If we get swept by the Yankees, we will be officially mathematically eliminated from playoff contention.  How can we be eliminated so early, you ask?  Well, we'll be 7 games behind them, with only 7 to go in the 16 game schedule, and they'll have the tiebreaker by beating us head-to-head, so... Wait - what's that you say?  We play 162 games?

The sky is falling!

Look up!  The team that was named 2012 World Champions before the season even started is 0-5!  For those of you who are bad at math, that projects to a 0-162 record over the season  So why aren't more people panicking?  Is it because here in Canada most fans are too busy following the last few days of the ice hockey regular season, to notice that baseball has started?

MLB Power Rankings - March edition

This is my last preseason power rankings.  I will update these near the beginning of each month throughout the season.  I will also update my preseason predictions before the season starts.

Numbers in brackets are movement from last month, and their high/low rank for the season.  Look at previous rankings(here for the initial January ones, and here for February) for explanations of how the team got to where they were - any explanation here just reflects recent changes.



#1 - Boston ( --, 1/1) They haven't done anything to drop from the top of the rankings.

Boston Red Sox - Any Number - Authentic Cool Base Alternate Red On-Field Jersey Customize it by putting ANY NUMBER on the back of it!  Check out many more MLB Jerseys and more at Fans Edge

#2 - Philadelphia (--, 2/2)  Some injuries may make them less formidable, but along with Boston they are still the only other team likely to win 95 games.
#3 - Minnesota (--, 3/5) Beating up on weak division opponents will help their win total.

MSP Annual is here!!!

Today, I received my Maple Street Press Red Sox Annual 2001.

 My friend, Reg over at the Rulebook Guru, got a free copy of it as a member of the Baseball Blogger's Alliance (note to self: find out how to get in on that!), with an expectation that he'd write a review on it.   I will be reviewing it on his behalf, but here's a sneak preview....

Former Red Sox Bruce Hurst at Vauxhall

Pitcher Bruce Hurst, will be at the Vauxhall Academy Awards Scholarship Fundraising Dinner on Saturday evening at the Vauxhall Community Hall.  Tickets are still available, and this is a great opportunity to listen to and meet a former Red Sox great.

More details and ticket info here.

Canadian Red Sox

Today I received a bunch of baseball cards that I won in a contest.   As I was flipping through them I saw a George Kottaras card and started thinking about what Canadians are currently on the roster, or even at Spring Training as non-roster invitees.  After all, in the recent past, we have had players such as Jason Bay, Matt Stairs, Eric Gagne, Adam Stern and Rheal Cormier as Canadian fulltime members of the Red Sox.

MLB Power Rankings - February edition

I will be providing monthly updates of the power rankings.   Expect them on or near the 1st of each month going forward.   Spring Training hasn't even started yet, so there isn't much movement from my original rankings, but there have been a few moves made, so it was time for an update, along with some commentary where a team moved significantly.  (numbers in bracket are last month's ranking)

#1.  Yankees (9) - Brian Cashman must have seen that I ranked them embarrassingly low, so he went out and starting signing all stars, and it helped get his team back atop the rankings.  First the pitching - he inked 2 top