ground-ball pitchers, pandas, victorino's rickety spine and the hope of mookie betts: your 2015 Boston Red Sox

xxp like, lyons? barf. eck? passable...i guess? wake would be ok maybe but i dont think he'd want to call whole games or travel that much. tom caron? meh.

well i'm thinking the pbp chair, not the color chair. so the two people i know of are the pawsox guy who did a week of games back around the allstar break and dave o'brien who is competent but kind of a drag.

for scaling remy back i think we know a lot more about the options. i like eck a lot but he won't do the majority of the schedule due to travel. i can't stand lyons but apparently the nesn people love him or something.

reckon bad ratings have a lot more to do with finishing in last place three out of four years than orsillo or remdawg

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe5BRcuH41Q

what if they got pedro tho

can't imagine he'd want to do a full schedule but

i like eck, he actually brings some knowledge and appears to be paying attention to the game

but yeah no idea about pbp. orsillo is one of the few guys i actually like. baseball really is a cruel sport.

hanle y is practicing at first

makes sense

ultimately it's a good - even exciting - lineup, sox just need about 4 or 5 pitchers

Cherington did show up at the Saberseminar, post-firing!

In a kinder world, the first question would’ve been a softball about David Ortiz, or a request to explain Alejandro De Aza. Instead, it started with, “So … Hanley Ramirez.” It took several seconds for the resulting laughter to subside.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/2015-mlb-hanley-ramirez-left-field-defense-boston-red-sox/

chris sale the latest victim (albeit technically by ND this time rather than allowing 5 runs like the first time) in the continuing saga of "the red sox beating aces despite constantly losing to pitchers of literally any other skill level"

also, porcello last night: 7.0 IP, 5H, 0R/ER, 0BB, 5K.

porcello's last start vs the same team: 2.0 IP, 10H, 6R, 5ER, 1BB, 2K

~what a difference sinkerball pitchers actually throwing sinkers makes~

seeing Owens v Harvey tonight

@pgammo
It's a good mprning when you can look at a 6 4 0 0 3 8 Rich Hill line in Pawtucket

morbs you saw a pretty rad win for the sox!

bullshit

i was doing "Good Night Swihart" jokes all night, and look what happened!

Some "cute" Massholes on the 7 train tho.

we're an adorable people

those of you without joe kelly's mustache, maybe

joe kelly is the first red sox pitcher to win six games in a calendar month since pedro in '99

got that cy young on lock obvs

still zero explanation re: orsillo

highly doubt NESN will ever issue an official one

Jessica Moran @JessMoranCSN
Chili Davis on Jackie Bradley Jr.- "Now he's starting to feel sexy at the plate."

rick porcello in his 12th loss: 8.0 IP, 5H, 3R/1ER, 1BB, 13K.

eat shit, stephen drew

how are porcello and kelly suddenly these amazing pitchers???

porcello is basically being exactly who he always was on the tigers in these past two starts - the two-seamer is sinking at just the right time almost every time and he's minimizing use of the four-seamer that he just wasn't suited to. and when he did deploy the four-seamer last night dudes weren't expecting it, offspeed pitches also looked pretty good

if he can do even 75 percent of what that start was on a regular basis (and maybe not be waylaid by jackassery at 1st and actually receive run support), he'll be fuckin gravy

kelly...that's a bit dicier, bc it's at least part luck. but a fair amount of it is real, he's using the curve and changeup more often and with what seems like better judgment of the situation. the contact his pitches is generating is mostly weak as hell of late

apparently I'm wrong as hell about kelly statswise - his ground ball rate has actually gone down, hard contact rate has gone up - but whatever kelly is doing, it's working for now - no clue whether or not it's sustainable

http://giant.gfycat.com/GleefulTalkativeDesertpupfish.gif

damn dog

yikes

henry owned, ryan cooked

https://twitter.com/DanHirsch/status/639506275630379008

welp, that solves the issue of what im going to eat for dinner tonight (it's obv gonna be chicken)

@kirkmin
Per sources, NESN - facing huge backlash - asked Don Orsillo to tweet that he wasn't being fired and it was a mutual parting. He declined.

jeez

and so joseph of house kelly, second of his name, he of fantastic hair and atrocious mustache, did become the first pitcher in the league to win seven straight games in the year 2015

sox have won 13 of their last 19 games, playing with gusto and the best outfield in the majors

gonna be a mean team next year

i just love all these dudes, honestly. i sort of don't want hanley to work out at first cause i've fallen in love with shaw so much :/

I feel you man, I like hanley for intangible reasons but if they absolutely have to sacrifice him on the carl crawford memorial altar, I'd get over it

already preparing to send him up the river one year into his contract?! you guys are cold.

hey now, I said I'd get over it. did not specify how long it would take. I like hanley more than most fans I know, so it'd take quite some time!

I also don't think his bat is a lost cause just yet, but if midway through next season he still isn't consistently hitting, I dunno, because the bat needs to work for him to take over at DH when papi retires after next season

Papi said he's retiring after next year?

or, is he unaware you guys plan on "retiring" him?!

next year is the last year of his latest extension and he's about to be 40! i dont want to see him go full jeter, whimpering his way out and quite possibly costing his team a WC berth (as jetes did last year)

he's been tremendous this second half and could probably be pretty solid for one more year but i dont see him going past 2016. honestly wasnt sure he'd make it through 2015 given the egregious struggles in the first half

rich hill is starting against the rays this coming sunday. rich hill last started a game july 27, 2009, and is currently 35.

exciting times!

any collapse can happen with the sox bullpen involved, but being up 10-1 bodes well for the improbable continuation of joe kelly's win streak

a friend writes:

Saw a nice interview with Peter Gammons today. You guys probably know all this, but he was raving about the Sox hiring Brian Bannister, who has his own analytics company, to help evaluate their major league pitching (son of Alan Bannister, who I think I remember seeing pitching at the Original Comiskey for the Chisox in the 80’s). Pitching coach Carl Wills welcomed the help, and as a result they completely changed the pitch selection of Joe Kelly and Porcello, emphasis on using their change-up and curve along with a four-seamer to change the eye level (Kelly has the 4th highest velocity in the league, he said). Old School and New School holding hands to put the Sox back on the map. Dombrowki, the old schooler, was so impressed he named Bannister the new Director of Pitching Analytics and Development. Of course it was Cherington who brought Bannister in, lotta good it did him. Maybe they don’t need to import and ace, maybe Kelly is it?

damn papi really didn't waste much time getting to 500 the past several weeks