Sports

Sorry about the playoff race banner. I’m a Red Sox fan, and the information is of some importance to me, you see. Take heart: as soon as the Sox flop I’ll remove it.

Actually, Dan (original), Pedro is not “the neediest 10-game winner in baseball history.” He’s the guy who’s giving the Boston Red Sox a chance to win a World Series. It’ll take Manny and Nomar and Varitek to get us to the playoffs, but if the Sox get there, it’s going to be Pedro Martinez and Derek Lowe who take the team the rest of the way. This team — this city — needs Pedro. ...

Via the Dead Parrots, one of the more painful pictures (original) I’ve ever seen. That sucker’s in there.

Pyeongchang (original), not Pyongyang (original). Doh!

The Red Sox picked up a pitcher at the trade deadline, to nobody’s surprise. But it’s a really interesting trade — I’m coming to the conclusion that Theo Epstein has some kind of a mind control ray. Follow this one with me: A couple of weeks ago, the Red Sox traded Brandon Lyon and Anastacio Martinez to the Pirates for Scott Sauerbeck and Mike Gonzalez. Sauerbeck and Lyon were the meat of the trade. Sauerbeck is a very good lefthanded reliever, and Lyon is a young guy with promise but a tendency to be wild. Good trade for the Sox. ...

It’s a sign of Red Sox obsession that my first reaction to this trade was “ah, the Yankees just want to rub our noses in 1986.” However, I confidently predict that if the Yankees are foolish enough to put Orosco up against the powerful Red Sox lineup, the mighty Red Sox bats will erase the memory of those awful seven games.

I went to the 2003 Reebok Pro Summer League (original) today. Well, mostly; in the middle of it all I snuck away to Fenway Park to help a friend buy Red Sox gear and eat good Indian food. But mostly I went to the basketball. And then I wrote about it. But I like you, so I will not put everything I wrote on the front page.

Someone needs to let the Raptors know that it’s quality, not quantity. Doing PR work to discuss signing Jason Kidd is one thing. PR work to hype the signing of a guy — Mengke Bateer — who averaged less than 1 point a game last season is another thing. And they haven’t even signed the guy yet. They’re hoping to sign him. There can’t possibly be any serious competition for him. How pathetic is it to say “well, we’re hoping to sign the second best Chinese-born player in the NBA”? Pretty damned pathetic. ...

Hint to Roger Clemens: nobody likes you much. Poor guy. He has a milestone season, gets his 300th win, strikes out his 4,000th man, and yet nobody wants him to get that final All-Star appearance in the final season of his career. The public didn’t vote for him, the players didn’t vote for him, the manager didn’t select him, and now Commissioner Selig doesn’t want anyone to make an exception for him. Possibly all that stuff about not showing up for the Hall of Fame induction backfired, huh?

Sports Illustrated recently launched a new fantasy baseball game. It complements their existing fantasy baseball game, I suppose. It’s called Baseball Challenge: Salary Cap Challenge. Yep. It’s a fantasy baseball game that sells itself with the salary cap. As a Celtics fan laboring under the emotional weight of the Vin Baker trade, I find this painfully depressing. It doesn’t look like it’s really that different than any other fantasy baseball game — salary caps are nothing new in that world — but did they have to sell it as the “Cripple Your Team For Years With One Stupid Guaranteed Contract Challenge”? (Rephrasing mine.)