 Jonathan Van Every sure has had an interesting time of it since being called up. (Photo by Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images) |
Forget any other aspects of Thursday night’s game. Only one thing lost that game: pitching. Matt Garza’s excellent pitching and Josh Beckett’s, well, not-so excellent pitching.
Good news? Well Josh Beckett seems to be pissed right now so maybe that will translate into some awesomeness next time around.
“I just gave up seven [expletive] runs in five innings,” Beckett said in a nearly empty visitors’ clubhouse. “That’s not close to me. Is that close to you? Yeah, it’s frustrating. It’s a lot of things. I just got to make adjustments. Obviously, I didn’t do that between my last two starts.”
Here’s hoping he does “that” this time around.
I’m only mildly ashamed to admit that I was very happy when Jacoby broke up the perfect game in the seventh inning. (Very impressive outing for Matt Garza. Definitely deserves a tip of the hat. But I’m really glad the Rays didn’t no-hit/perfect game the Sox.)
Let’s just take comfort in there being three more games of this series. Today is definitely a good day to trot out “As long as they win the series, I’ll be happy”. I mean it, too. It’s painful to watch your team get hammered that way but when you look at the big picture, well, they’re going to lose some. It’s over and now the focus goes to winning some.
In Pawtucket, Charlie Zink got hammered for five runs in a PawSox loss and Kyle Snyder’s Buffalo Bisons avoided another loss by having yet another game rained out. Interesting about the Bisons rain out: They scheduled the double-header for today to start at 5:30pm. So there will be a genuine double-header. MLB needs to look into doing this once in a while.
Let’s focus on something positive: Dave Roberts is coming back to Boston!
NESN announced today that Roberts, the former Red Sox outfielder and postseason hero, has joined the network to serve as a studio analyst. Roberts will join Hall of Famers Dennis Eckersley and Jim Rice on NESN’s pre- and post-game shows.
“We are thrilled to have Dave join our team of outstanding studio analysts,†said Joel Feld, NESN’s executive vice president of programming and executive producer. “Dave is an icon in Red Sox Nation. He has a deep knowledge of the game and understands the passion of Red Sox fans.â€
Roberts will make his NESN debut this Monday from the new Yankee Stadium when the Red Sox play the Yankees. During the game, he will also join NESN’s Red Sox broadcast team of Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy in the booth for a couple of innings.
I’m fairly certain the only thing to help a Red Sox/Yankees series not be so painful is Dave Roberts. Hell, I’m certain that Dave Roberts could take a rainbow, wrap it in a sigh, soak it in the sun and make a groovy lemon pie at this point. He can do anything!
And now he’ll be doing it on my television!! As noted by my exclamation points, I’m very excited about this!
Tonight, Justin Masterson will make us forget last night.