Sweet, Chilly Fenway Park

I have to start out this entry with an apology. My debut for my Red Sox blog was a little sub par to say the least. I had the flu bug for the previous 24 hours and I think I was a little delirious. I can recall writing about being a Sox fan, and then writing something about Jonathan Papelbon and that’s about it. So hopefully today’s work will be a little easier to comprehend.

Before we get started on today’s game with the Seattle Mariners I’ll start with a brief 2007 regular season retrospective. Boston started off on Opening Day with a sputter against the Kansas City Royals only managing one run in the first inning against the $55 million man, Gil Meche. Coupled with Curt Shilling giving up more runs than I would care to count, it was a pretty awful way to begin the season. But Schil showed up a little, um, overweight for camp so we’ll let that one slide after redeeming himself against the Texas Rangers on Sunday Night Baseball. I was on hand for the Sox 2^nd victory of the year over said Royals and witnessed the debut of “Dice-K.” He didn’t throw the super fun time happy gyro ball like I expected, but it was great outing none the less. Dice threw over 60% of his pitches for strikes, fanned 10 and only gave up one earned run on a home run to David DeJesus in the bottom of the 6^th which turned out to be Kansas City’s only run on the day. I froze my ass off but it’s a rare deal to see my team so I’ll take what I can get. Boston would go on to Arlington, Texas to lose 2 of 3 but rebounded nicely today against the above mentioned Mariners.

Second year Red Sox starter Josh Beckett earned his second win on the year by only giving up one run, two hits and striking out eight as Boston (finally) poured on the offense scoring 14 runs in their Fenway Park home opener. I know it’s only one week in to the season but I was a little worried that the most runs the Red Sox could muster up in one game was seven against the lowly Royals. I’m thinking it’s just the cold weather and the offense will pick up a little bit and get a much needed increase in production by adding the likes of JD Drew and lead off short stop Julio Lugo, who is a career .277 hitter. While that isn’t great, it is certainly solid and it’s probably going to pan out the same way if Johnny Damon was still leading off at the top line up. Fuckin’ Yankees. However, I digress.

The big bats in the Red Sox line up had a stand out day and either hit, batted in runs, or scored runs to help the overall 14 run effort. It was also nice to see manager Terry Francona recognize the fact that the Mariners were not going to catch the Red Sox after the 5^th inning and gave David Ortiz, Manny Ramirez, and Drew the rest of the day off and save them for when they’ll be needed. Tomorrow’s contest features the much anticipated (not by me, however) Dice-K vs. Ichiro match up staring at 7:05 Eastern Time. Expected on the mound for the Mariner’s will be Felix Hernandez who had a strong eight inning outing and subsequent victory against the Oakland A’s on Opening Day.

Other notes: Middle reliever Javier Lopez, who the Sox gave a fresh contract renewal to in March, was optioned to AAA Pawtucket to make room for returning set-up man Mike Timlin coming off the DL. Timlin would come into the Red Sox-Mariner’s game today in the 9^th to give up 2 runs, which was excusable considering the Sox were up by 13 at the time. Hopefully the oblique holds up and doesn’t cost us when the games are a little tighter. Thanks for showing your age today, Mike!