Month: March 2004

2004 Season Preview

Now that another wild and crazy off-season is finally coming to an end, it’s time to dust off the binoculars and look over the field of players that will be putting on a uniform for the Boston nine this season. For you holdovers from last season, you won’t see many differences; the only significant loss being 2B Todd Walker, who left as a free agent and signed with the Chicago Cubs. Where the Sox have improved the most is with the pitching staff, having added starting pitcher Curt Schilling and closer Keith Foulke to give the Red Sox a solid staff on the mound. On paper, you have to like what you see, but this column would be relatively uninteresting if we didn’t take a closer look, let’s answer some self-imposed questions first.

1. Who will be the number one starter, Schilling or Pedro Martinez?

The truth is that there is no “number one” on this team, but Pedro will have the honor of opening the season against Baltimore on 04 April. While a definite rotation has not been set to my knowledge, there is a good chance that Schilling and Martinez will NOT pitch in back-to-back games this season. More likely, we will watch Tim Wakefield‘s knuckleball flutter between their starts. So does that make Schilling a number three starter? The good news for Red Sox nation is that Boston has one of its strongest rotations in years; when you toss in Derek Lowe, you have four proven starters that between them could easily collect 70 wins.

2. Will Bill Mueller have another career year?

It’s unlikely that Mueller and the rest of his team will repeat the offensive output that they had last season, when they out-slugged the 1927 New York Yankees and were first in runs scored in the majors. Still, it’s very likely that he can hit .300 again and continue to use the Wall to his advantage. He’s probably also good for another 10 to 15 home runs. Most importantly, he has proven himself at third base, one of the trickiest positions in baseball to play.

3. Is manager Terry Francona on the hot seat already?

Given the fact that there are several big contracts that expire at the end of this season, the pressure is on for the Red Sox to go all the way, if you ignore the fact that history and the other 29 teams are not on their side. Francona was not the first choice that the Red Sox had but, if consider that Grady Little, who had no major league coaching experience when he was named manager two years ago, won nearly 200 games in two years, you just need to have enough knowledge and personnel skills to repeat that success. As long as he is smart enough to pull a pitcher who is obviously fatigued late in a Game Seven, then he should do fine.

4. Who will see more time at first, David Ortiz or Kevin Millar?

Ortiz would like to spend more time covering the bag, but he will come second to Millar. However, when Ellis Burks is used as the DH, Ortiz will win over Millar on this battle. Ortiz just has better numbers at the plate and the Sox will not want to keep his bat out of the lineup too often.

5. What free-agent signing will have the highest impact?

Although Curt Schilling’s presence in the lineup will make the starting rotation an opponent’s nightmare, having Keith Foulke come in to shore up the closer role will mean the most to this club. Since Derek Lowe’s 2000 season in that role, the Sox have been very weak in this respect. Lowe faltered the following year, Ugueth Urbina was anything but solid in 2002, and the closer-by-committee experiment last season was, while a sound idea in theory, a complete failure in practice. Foulke collected 43 saves in his one year in Oakland and that means that the rest of the bullpen can be used better to set him up to close the door.

6. What bench player will have the highest impact?

My money is on Gabe Kapler, who enjoyed a solid spring and will actually start the season in right field as a replacement for the injured Trot Nixon. Once Nixon returns in May, Kapler will likely take a seat on the bench but will called out for service if Manny Ramirez is thrown into the DH role or is given a seat by Francona to rest for a day. He also makes a nice pinch hitter should the opponent throw out a left-handed reliever, having hit .326 last season against southpaws.

7. Will the Red Sox be able to hold off the Yankees and win the AL East?

As strong as the Red Sox have become with several key additions, you cannot ignore the Yankees, who have also made key additions for another chance at a World Series title. They certainly have a stronger lineup with the addition of Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield. The only real question for the Yankees will be if Kevin Brown can have an injury-free season and if newcomer Javier Vazquez, recently of the Montreal Expos, will prove unflappable under the lights of Yankee fans and the front office. As Sox fans have seen for the last six years, you can never underestimate New York; every year, they remain tough. It helps when your owner is willing to shell out nearly $200 million to pay for the collective salary of this team.

8. Overall, is Boston good enough to… you know?

Anybody who has followed the Red Sox as long as I have knows enough NOT to start opening the champagne bottles prematurely. However, with all that happened during the off-season, good and bad, Boston has made significant strides to improve on a team that came very close to tasting a championship in 2003. It will be critical for Boston to play to this potential if they are to stay ahead of the Yankees. With the addition of Schilling, the starting rotation looks strong and, with the addition of Foulke, so does the bullpen. Although it will tough to match last season’s offensive output, there are plenty of bats available to score runs when needed and, defensively, the Red Sox are better than average at most positions and should keep the untimely errors to a minimum. In conclusion, the 2004 edition of the Boston nine is good enough, but let’s not say any more than that.

Got Juice?

(Note: This article was published by the author on another Red Sox web site prior to the establishment of this site.)

Forty-three years ago, the nation was entranced by the battle being waged between Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris, two Yankee greats who spent a summer trying to reach a baseball milestone: 61 home runs. This number would be one better than Babe Ruth‘s record, one that had been preserved for 34 years. Maris eventually reached this plateau, but his record was noted with an asterisk because he had played a 162-game season, unlike Ruth who had played in a 152-game one.

Thirty-seven years later, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa were credited with bringing life back into baseball when they went toe-to-toe to try and break this mark. McGwire reached the 62 home run mark in early September and, before the season ended, he had an amazing 70 round-trippers. But we remember also that, late in the season, McGwire admitted that he had been taking performance-enhancing drugs to help create those arms that looked as big as tree trunks. Eventually, the controversy was swept under the carpet and the focus turned to seeing if another could top that.

Only three years passed before we had an answer. After reaching the 500 career home run mark early in the season, Barry Bonds, the son of former player Bobby Bonds and godson of baseball legend “Say Hey” Willie Mays went on a tear and clobbered an amazing 73 home runs that season. To those who watched, his swing seemed almost effortless and the ball would sail well into upper decks and the far reaches of the stands. Before beginning his home run trot, Bonds would stay at the plate and admire the flight of the ball for a few seconds as if he were as astonished as the fans were of the power he possessed in those muscular cannons.

Now, mere weeks away from the opening of the 2004 baseball campaign, the suspicions of many have been made truth: that players, under invisible pressure in an effort to draw the crowds, have been taking steroids and other drugs to enhance their bodies and become modern-day Goliaths. This after random drug tests conducted last year confirmed that as many as five percent of those tested were juiced and after testimony in a legal case accused several baseball All-Stars of being supplied with steroids. One of those named was, sadly, Barry Bonds.

So where do we go from here? Has the game of baseball been ruined? Will the MLB suddenly find itself swept under the rug as has the XFL and the WUSA? The good news is that the baseball season has NOT been canceled at this point and that the Boston Red Sox have yet another chance to end the championship drought by season’s end, unless the New York Yankees again have the last say.

Yet perhaps this is another answer to bringing back a level playing field to the game of baseball besides the financial arguments. With the chance of being suspended from baseball either for weeks, months, or even years, perhaps some of those players will see the risk and decided that it isn’t worth it. It will also give more athletes who have played by the rules a better chance to become major-league ballplayers someday. Then, the competition will return to the field instead of being away from it; it will depend less on drugs and dangerous supplements and focus more on a natural strength and conditioning routine.

Granted, the healing process will be long and painful for baseball. There are probably many fans that, along with other reasons that have been given, will throw in the towel and no longer financially support a “tainted” game. Even those who stay, if they have not already been, will become more suspicious of a player’s ability when he steps up to the plate and jacks one into the seats. Parents may wonder further whether these athletes are good role models for the children who mimic the behavior and style of play of the professional players in the field and at the plate. Above all, the trust in these players, who have continued to proclaim their innocence, may soon be lost, whether they are guilty or not.

The players, and the game itself, must move on and shed this image as quickly as possible and bring an honest, open game back to the fans. Lessons from this must be learned and never forgotten. Several years after Maris broke the home run record, the asterisk was removed and he was given due respect for his accomplishment. Following these revelations, baseball will wear an asterisk from now until the wounds heal and the scars fade.