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I realize last night’s start did nothing to inspire confidence in Daisuke Matsuzaka. Throwing four wild pitches in one game is not exactly what anybody had in mind when the Sox reactivated Dice-K for this start. I do give him a little bit of leeway, since this was his first start back from the DL and he was working with a new catcher who speaks a different language than him. Even so, there is no excuse for his lack of command last night. Look at the PITCHf/x data – his fastball was all over the place, the slider was in the upper half of the zone about 50% of the time, and he was inconsistent with the changeup and curveball, when he risked throwing them at all. For a guy who’s all about honoring the game and his country, that was a shameful performance. Get it together, Dice-K!
David Ortiz continues to struggle, and is now hitting a paltry .193/.298/.298 for the year. I’m still not convinced that Papi’s career is over, though I’m fine with dropping him to 5th or 6th in the lineup, as Francona did against the Twins this week. Before you call me crazy, recall that Big Papi was hitting just .198/.305/.351 on May 2 last year, and that turned out okay, wrist and all. Of course, this is the end of May and numbers are starting to mean something at this stage of the year, so I’m not ruling anything out, either. It’s quite possible that his wrist is not as whole as everyone thinks it is. If that’s the case, you can not simply cut him or trade him, because he could very well return to form, given enough rest.
The home run drought is over. Mercifully, it’s over. Maybe now David Ortiz can relax some and stop flailing at pitches out of the zone that he has no business flailing at. Maybe now he can stop overswinging and get back into his groove. Maybe now sports journalists like Jim Donaldson can stop the crazy talk about dropping Papi to 7th or trading for his replacement. With Kevin Youkilis and Daisuke Matsuzaka ready to return, this may signal a resurrection for the Sox, who have been uneven at times.
Dustin Pedroia, last year’s MVP, left yesterday’s game with a groin strain. That leaves Nick Green starting at second base and Julio Lugo at shortstop, not exactly an inspiring combination. It shouldn’t keep Pedey off the field more than a couple of days, but combine that with Kevin Youkilis’ injury, and suddenly you’ve taken a lot of firepower out of that lineup and the defense on the right side of the diamond suffers tremendously. The pitching will have to do it tonight if we want to win.
J.D. Drew is sitting with that quad again, which was fine today with Scott Kazmir on the mound. But it’d be nice to get him back in the lineup sooner rather than later. Somewhat more worrisome to me is Kevin Youkilis being out with tightness in his side. It’s improving, but the Sox are loathe to test it prematurely. Asked about it today, Youk said he has no clue what it is. Jacoby Ellsbury is back in the lineup after tweaking his hamstring at the end of last week. Read the rest of this entry »
