Shipping Up to Boston in a Sinking Ship

It has officially been the greatest collapse Major League Baseball has seen in September ever. This is worse than the '66 Cardinals. Worse than the '07 Mets. The Boston Red Sox have gone from being the mighty Thor, with the hammer of the Gods... to being the nail, being hammered by the Gods.

Watching the loss last night in Baltimore the month of September can pretty much be summed up by the inside the park home run given up with 2 outs in the sixth inning. Robert Andino hit a fly ball out to the warning track in center field. It appeared that Ellsbury had a read on it, the ball landed in his glove... then he smacked into the wall and dropped the ball, allowing 3 runs to score, and the game being put out of reach for the once mighty Sox.

Is that not the perfect metaphor? Routine season, playing well, then we hit September (the wall) and drop the ball. Runs get scored on the Sox like defense is going of style.

A couple of great statistics here to consider; in the month of September the Boston Red Sox have given up over 70 runs. They have also given up over 20 errors. When the pitching staff is not giving you anything to work with you need your defense to pick things up for you. This is just not happening with the Red Sox.

On ESPN today they are reporting that the Red Sox may try to trade for a starting pitcher for tomorrow night. Names like Bruce Chen from the Royals, Ted Lily from the Dodgers or Chris Capuano from the Mets are being thrown around. If Theo Epstein makes a move like this it is out of sheer desperation. The idea of bringing in an outsider to start one game (and not be playoff eligible) is absurd to me. More so, the other two names being shopped were (get this) Carlos Zambrano from the Cubs whom has not pitched since August 12th. The other name (I hope your sitting) would be Pedro Martinez.

I sit here shaking my head at this team. My team. With all of the errors, the lack of passion, the fact that I have to watch John Lackey pitch, still I believe.

I may be an eternal optimist, who knows? What I do know is that the playoffs do not start on Friday for the Sox. They start tonight. So, go get 'em Eric Bedard. If you remember, you pitched in Baltimore and did quite well there. How about a glimpse of that old you tonight? If you don't a loss tonight will probably punch the tickets not to Tampa Bay or Detroit. We'll be shipping up to Boston alright. I just don't know how many people will be at the docks waiting.