The Pink Sports Blog

Defense Steps Up, Offense Gets Away With One

2011-10-18T19:49:00.000-07:00

Well, if your defense has to wait six weeks to step up, it might as well do it when your offense has its worst outing of the season. Despite three sacks, two interceptions and a pair of fumbles, Brady pulled off a 20-16 win with an 8 yard touchdown pass to Aaron Hernandez. You have to give Rob Ryan credit for an effective scheme against Brady but at the end of the day, he and Belichik are poised to go down in history as the winningest coach-quarterback duo in NFL history for a reason.

It's enough to make you forget about the soap opera going on in the Fenway.

Where's the Other Glamor Boy?

2011-10-11T04:58:00.000-07:00

For some reason I can't begin to fathom, Yahoo Sports trumpeted the Pats-Jets outing as a battle of the NFL's Glamor Boys. Well, there's that super model's husband so that's one. Who's the other one? Stupid headlines aside, I still don't see any consistent defense coming from the Patriots. Thank God the Jets offensive line isn't so great but sooner or later our offense is not going to be able to compensate for the inability to stop teams from doing whatever they want. You can't depend on scoring thirty points or more all the time. The defensive schemes have got to get better as well. Even great defenses have a hard time covering man to man every play. The game played out more or less how I thought it would but I'm really starting to get nervous that this defense is never going to gel.

Tommy and the Boys Are Back!

2011-10-04T04:56:00.000-07:00

Well, I'll take a game that looks ugly at first and turns into a win rather than last week's outing that started off pretty and ended up in a loss. Tom Brady must have enjoyed showing the folks at home in California what success looks like. I'll admit to feeling a little sad to see Richard Seymour in a Raiders shirt and on any other day I might have been pulling for him. At the end of the day Wes Welker was his usual unstoppable self and the Raiders had more penalties than they could handle but the Pats defense is still horrible. Ok, my favorite play of the game was Vince Wilfork's interception but the offense can only compensate for so long, even an offense with Tom Brady and Wes Welker on it. The Bill is supposed to be this big defensive guy. So defend already!

In more hilarious news, Hank Williams Jr got his Monday Night Football theme yanked by ESPN when he went on Fox and Friends and compared President Obama to Adolf Hitler. Dear Hank: when the only two things you have going for you are your daddy's name and one song that you've been milking for 23 years, don't screw up your gig by running your mouth. Just another one of Ophelia's rules for life: Either have a great Plan B or hang onto Plan A for all you're worth.

Sorry Papelbon, but You're No Mariano Rivera.

2011-10-01T09:12:00.000-07:00

"Clubhouse complacency? In baseball? I mean...how excited can you get waiting ten minutes between pitches for Papp to decide to throw the fastball or the...fastball?"

This is a quote from a friend of mine (who shall remain anonymous unless he chooses to claim it) and I've gotta say, it's pretty dead on. In early 2008, while still hammering out his contract with the Red Sox, Jonathan Papelbon actually had the hubris to compare himself to Mariano Rivera. You know Mariano Rivera; he's the guy who's been shutting down games for the Yankees since Papelbon was in high school. Don't get me wrong, I had high hopes for Papelbon especially after two 30 save seasons but lately he's looked, well, average. The Red Sox have got to get more efficient in every area of pitching but it won't do them any good to get aces and strong relievers if their closers can't close out the game. Maybe taking some of the pressure off will help Papelbon get his game back. We'll talk about the bats another time, but you can only get so many hits out of your lineup, it all starts with pitching. So go get some pitching Theo and please don't throw millions of dollars away on worthless free agents who won't get you anything when you try to unload them in a year or two. Oh and if I ask super nicely, can I get a freakin' shortstop please? Pretty please???

Tito Francona, Boston's Latest Scapegoat.

2011-09-30T17:05:00.000-07:00

Good-bye Tito. For what it's worth I think you're getting the shaft. You're not the one who can't hit a fast ball, can't pitch, can't field and can't close a game. Theo Epstein, on the other hand, seems rather adept at blowing millions of dollars on free agents who can't hit a fast ball, can't pitch, can't field and can't close a game. When's the last time we had a real shortstop Theo? Who thought Crawford and Lackey were championship personnel? Who doesn't think that Beckett is over? Do you suppose Wakefield is going to live forever? Tito, I think you worked miracles getting this assortment of personnel anywhere near the wild card race and for that I thank you. I thank you for the two championships and five playoff appearances. I thank you for doing what no other coach has done in Boston since 1918. Mostly I thank you for bringing us some of the best baseball this ungrateful town has ever seen, and for doing it with composure and decency. I'm sure you have a job already, I imagine the Cubs are wondering right now if you can do in Chicago what you did in Boston and I see no reason why you can't. Quite honestly, if what you've accomplished in Boston isn't good enough for the Red Sox front office, I have no idea who could possibly fit the bill but as long as Theo Epstein is picking talent it's going to be an uphill climb for your successor. Good luck, Tito, wherever you land.

In somewhat related news, John Henry suffered minor injuries on his yacht today. I was nowhere near the marina, I swear.

On to the Next One

2011-09-29T16:44:00.000-07:00

I didn't watch any sports tv today. I avoided the internet (until now), the radio, most of my family and a sizeable number of my friends. The facts are inescapable. The Red Sox season is over and deservedly so. With no strong starters, nothing coming out of the bullpen, bats that won't heat up and a closer who is either overworked (my husband's words) or undergood (my words) any foray into the post season was likely to brief, unspectacular and possibly quite painful. Still, we New Englanders cling to hope long after more reasonable follk have chalked up their losses, licked their wounds and moved on. I gave my annual "I'm really done with the Red Sox this time!" rant to which my husband rendered his traditional reply "See you next spring". And I'll be here. Four games into the season I'll say something idiotic like "The Red Sox are in first place" to which every member of Red Sox nation within hearing distance will nod and start listing off all the ways the Red Sox are better than the Yankees this year. For now, it's onto football and hockey, as a basketball season appears to be slipping away. All that's left to wonder about this baseball season is whether Tito and Theo keep their jobs.

What the......Huh?

2011-09-26T05:40:00.000-07:00

So Sunday was weird wasn't it? The Pats game was looking like one of those afternoons where you sit back in your comfy chair with a beer and a snack and make chit chat with your friends while glancing casually at the TV to watch your team roll over another victim. Except no one told the Bills they were supposed to be the victim.

Let me tell you about my day. It started off with a hot cup of tea and some homemade apple fritters, made with apples freshly picked by yours truly from a local orchard no less, followed by a leisurely walk to the park with my family where we took it in turns to jog the track while the on duty parent watched our son in the playground. The sky was blue and clear. The sun shone. Birds sang. Children laughed. We walked home hand in hand and settled our son with his Legos, our teen stumbled sleepily into the kitchen and mumbled something about her hair, the Pats put up 21 points in the first quarter. And it was good.

Oh sure the Sox were over on ESPN acting like a bunch of knuckleheads but that was to be expected in September. I may have been a bit concerned that the Pats didn't seem to have a pass rush or care if they had a running game but all in all, I was content. Suddenly, my perfect day began to unravel; not in that slow, inexorable way of a train wreck you can see coming for miles but are too far away to do anything about, no this game fell apart with an ease I imagine the Germans experienced while marching through Belgium and into France, tapping the French on their shoulders and saying: "Guess who? Nice fortifications you've got there, too bad they're facing the wrong way".

The Bills offense went through the Pats defense like a hot knife through butter. Their defense pressured Brady, forcing four interceptions in one game, as many as Brady had all last season. The Pats committed penalty after costly penalty, eight in all including a critical one on Vincent Wilfork for unsportsmanlike conduct that gave the Bills a new set of downs on the one yard line. Bill Belichik lost his mind. A timeout was charged to the Pats late in the fourth quarter that no one really seems to understand. Brady threw for 387 yards and four TD's, Welker caught for 217 and scored twice. None of it mattered as the stat that mattered most fell short.

The Sox split the doubleheader with the Yankees, which I more or less expected but what bothers me is that they don't even seem to be trying to win. As a friend of mine said, "If the Red Sox don't care about winning, why should I care about the Red Sox?". In related news, as if John Lackey weren't a loathsome enough individual, he's divorcing his cancer stricken wife of three years because their personalities conflict. Of course that statement makes the very broad assumption that Lackey has an actual personality but what do I know? I'm just a blogger from Podunk, New England who is wondering where all my sports heroes have gotten to.

So Much to Say, So Little Time

2010-11-01T13:07:00.000-07:00

OK, where do I start? Do I start with the glory that is Welker, Woodhead, Green-Ellis and Hernandez? The 65 yard touchdown pass to Brandon Tate on a broken play? Do I talk about the perfectly clean hit Myron Pryor put on Favre that was enough to put the old man out of a game he was losing (again) but not enough to shut him the hell up afterwards? Do I lead with Randy Moss' post game "q&a session" or the fact that the Vikings put him on waivers? That honeymoon was over faster than Britney Spear's Las Vegas wedding. Maybe I should talk about the fact that my contempt for Favre has grown to the point that he now reminds me of an old queen who won't give up the club scene and get out of the way of the younger crowd that doesn't want to see certain things sagging in sequins. All the drama, but a shadow of the boom-boom-pow.

I have no desire to see Moss come back to the Pats (if that's even being considered which I doubt) but I can't deny that this is absolutely hilarious. Randy seems, even now, to fail to comprehend that his mouth and his attitude are what got him sent from a 6-1 team to a 2-4 team. He wants to play on a winning team. He WAS playing on a winning team and like Logan Mankins, who is now riding his tractor instead of doing his job, Randy seems genuinely surprised that his spoiled diva routine didn't work. On Bill Belichik. I'm pretty sure they're the only two people who've ever met, seen or heard of Bill Belichik who are surprised by this.
I don't blame the Vikings for being done with Moss. After one catch for eight yards and a pathetic lack of effort against a team he should have been prepared for more than any other, this guy's got the cajones to stand at the front of the press pool with a Red Sox hat and act, somehow, like the injured party. I wouldn't have let him on the plane. Maybe now people around here will start listening to me when I say "No, please no, you DON'T want that clown on your team". Maybe.

Hey, we never even discussed the Touchdown That Wasn't. Some days this blog is so easy to write I feel guilty taking credit for it.

An Ugly W is Still a W

2010-10-26T05:18:00.000-07:00

Sunday's win against the Chargers may have looked ugly, (OK it was ugly) but it's better news than you think it is.

Welker continues to catch in every game he plays in, the defense is getting back to its old ways of forcing turnovers and getting to the quarterback, Hernandez and Woodhead are becoming big playmakers, Deaderick has sacked the quarterback in each of his two starts, Wright has done so in each of the last three games, Green-Ellis has scored in four consecutive games and the Pats can mail it in for a quarter and a half and still find a way to win. Sure, San Diego basically handed them a couple of opportunities (note to Richard Goodman: someone has to touch you while you're down for the play to end), but the teams that win are the teams that capitalize on the other teams' mistakes.

Kudos to the Chargers for almost getting it done, but almost doesn't win Championships. (Just ask the Giants. Hey, we almost beat them in SuperBowl XLII.) This game is not the red flag that some doomsayers around me are claiming. These are the Pats at their ugly best, winning when they show all the signs of coughing it up, turning it on only when they need to and then only just. We've had entire championship years that looked like this. Hence the saying around my family that Brady has a horseshoe up his...well, I'm sure you can figure out where.

What matters at the end of the season is how many games you've put in the W column. Nobody ultimately cares how they got there. Nobody is counting moral victories or beating an opponent in every stat except the one that counts. I'll take every W we get, the good, the bad and in this case, the ugly.

Randy Moss? WHO DAT?

2010-10-18T06:42:00.000-07:00

OK, I know what you're thinking: today's post is going to write itself. And you are correct! What can I say that hasn't already crossed your mind? Probably not much but here it is anyway.

Missing the deep threat in Randy Moss might have been a bigger deal if not for the outstanding contributions of WR Deion Branch (welcome back old friend) who has returned to the New England fold after having been gone since 2006 for reasons which no one cares to remember. Branch had as many catches in Sunday's game as Moss had in the first four games of the season.

These are the Patriots I miss. The guys who show up two thirds of the way through a game and pull it out at the end with a field goal. The young defense is coming together and shades of the old smash-mouth style that won three rings are beginning to shine through. (On a side note, I'd like to see Brandon Meriweather seriously punished for the helmet hit he put on Todd Heap. Tough defense is one thing, dirty is another.) The offense is a little less glamorous and a lot more efficient. I feel like we're getting the band back together.

Now if we could just get Brady to cut his hair.

Football Betting Odds: Week 6 Football Power Rankings

2010-10-17T11:13:00.000-07:00

by Lynn Smith

The New York Jets covered the NFL gambling lines on Monday as they defeated the Vikings and the Jets are the top team in the NFL power rankings going into Week 6. The NFL power rankings are dominated by AFC squads as they hold the top four spots. 2 of the top five squads meet this week in NFL lines as Baltimore plays against New England.

1. New York Jets : The Jets played a difficult test on Monday and came through against the Vikings. This team has the 2nd-highest scoring offense in the NFL.
2. The Baltimore Ravens are directly behind the Jets. Their defense will be fairly close to complete as soon as they get Ed Reed back from his hip injury.
3. Pittsburgh Steelers:. The Steelers might jump into the top spot with Ben Roethlisberger back after he missed the first several games of the season due to a suspension.
4. New England Patriots: Tom Brady will still get open receivers devoid of Moss.
5. Atlanta Falcons: The Atlanta Falcons are 4-1 and look like the best team in the NFC.
6 .New York Giants The New York Giants abruptly look as though they might be the best team in the NFC. They are finally receiving both sides of the ball, playing well at the same time.
7. Indianapolis Colts: This is not the same Colts team but they still have Peyton Manning. They are still in a four way tie for first place in the AFC South.
8. New Orleans Saints: What is wrong with the Saints?
9. Bears: The Bears are 4-1 but we still don't know how good they actually are.
10. Titans: The Titans were good enough to go on the road and beat Dallas in NFL gambling lines. The Titans have a realistic possibility to win any match as long as quarterback Vince Youthful doesn't turn over the ball.
11. Green Bay Packers: How the mighty have tumbled.
12. Redskins â€" Shanahan merely finds a method to win.
13. Houston Texans: Will the real Texans stand up?
14. Chiefs: They are no longer undefeated.
15. Philadelphia Eagles: Kolb or Vick?
16. Dolphins: A major match this week at Green Bay
17. Bucs: They went on the road and won at Cincinnati.
18. Jacksonville Jaguars: Somehow they are 3-2.
19. Viking: Brett Favre is old and he continues to throw interceptions.
20. Dallas Cowboys: They compete at Minnesota and the loser is going to be 1-4.
21. Arizona Cardinals: The Cardinals are winning once again.
22. Denver Broncos: The Broncos have Kyle Orton and not much else.
23. Chargers: A Norv Turner team struggling again.
24. St Louis Rams: It was ugly a week ago against Detroit.
25. Bengals: When does Marvin Lewis get the axe?
26. Seahawks: Does Marshawn Lynch make this team superior?
27. Oakland raiders: This team is capable of winning most of the time against the NFL sportsbook lines.
28. Detroit Lions: The Lions are much much better than their 1-4 record.
29. Cleveland Brown: If Seneca Wallace plays they can win.
30. San Francisco 49ers: This team just finds a method to lose.
31. Carolina Panthers: No quarterback and a lame duck head coach.
32. Buffalo Bills: They continue to be despairing.

About the Author

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Moss to Minnesota? Let's Hope So.

2010-10-06T04:49:00.000-07:00

All right, I admit it. I did not see the absolute railing that New England gave to Miami coming. Our defensive problems today (a young, inexperienced defense that has yet to gel) clearly beat our defensive problems of the last few seasons (an old slow defense that is only going to get older and slower) but I wasn't expecting the all day long @#$ whuppin' that was Monday night's game. This is Patriot's football. Lots of special teams magic, defensive beat-downs and interceptions,oh and the offense scored a couple of times too. New England became the only team in history to score on a rush, a pass, an interception, a kick return and a blocked field goal all in one game. On behalf of New Englanders everywhere, thank you Patrick Chung

So impressive was the Dolphins' bungling of this game that it cost their special teams coordinator, John Bonamego, his job.
That's the good news.

The better news is that there's a rumor floating around that Randy Moss might be traded to Minnesota. I hope so. Don't get me wrong, I actually like Randy Moss but I don't think he's a fit for this offense and I never have. Let him go somewhere he will be properly utilized and let us get on with life knowing that having a deep threat is helpful, but not that critical to the kind of conservative offense at which Brady excels. Give me a core of decent, dependable receivers and a great tight end (yes, Aaron Hernandez I'm talking to you) any day. That's how we get rings in New England.

Signs of Life, but Let's Not Get Carried Away Just Yet.

2010-09-27T18:35:00.000-07:00

Considering that New England is getting very little production out of either its front seven or its secondary these days it's a good thing they can score. Yeah, there was a little bit of a running game and Brady had a better day but this is still the Bills we're talking about here. There's no way on God's green Earth that Ryan Fitzpatrick should have that much time in the pocket. Patrick Chung is doing a respectable job at safety but the defense still has too many holes. I'm really liking what I see from the rookie tight end Aaron Hernandez.

The Jets win over Miami gives the Pats a golden opportunity to even out the divisional rankings with a win in Miami this weekend but that can only happen if the defense picks up its game.

The Bleacher Report Should Check it's Facts.

2010-09-24T10:27:00.000-07:00

I write a silly little sports blog in the middle of Nowhere New England and even I know enough to check my facts before I post. Yesterday Phil Shore wrote this article for the Bleacher Report in which he raises some very good questions about the New England Patriots' running back position in light of the Lawrence Maroney trade (buh-bye) and the injury to Kevin Faulk (ouch!). It's a pretty good article. Pretty good that is, until you get to the part where Phil Shore apparently can't be bothered to look up the Patriot's schedule on, oh say, I don't know, about a dozen different sites where it's listed. Shore has the Patriots going to Miami in Week 3 when in reality it's Buffalo at New England in Week 3 and New England at Miami in Week 4.

The first game gives me mild concern. The second games gives me agida (a nervous condition that can only be experienced by people of Italian descent, from the Italian "agitare": to agitate, which can mean either heartburn or mental aggravation. Or both. Look it up, it's in the Urban Dictionary). Phil Shore's oversight merely annoys me. He's a journalist, he should verify his facts. This isn' t even a tough fact to verify. He could have checked NFL.com or the Patriots' website. Or the TV guide. Or asked my Dad. Anyone of those sources would have corrected his mistake before he committed it to the world wide web although to be fair, he probably doesn't have my Dad's number.

I tried commenting on the article to correct it but the comment wouldn't save and I noticed that it had no comments which I found unusual. Maybe the site is having issues and poor Phil can't log in to correct his error. We'll cut him some slack since he was right about everything else he wrote. These are just the little things in life that drive me nuts....and there are many.

Hey Hollywood Tom, Dial it Down

2010-09-20T05:35:00.000-07:00

Randy Moss is a bad karma guy. I said it when we got him and I'm saying it now. I don't think we're winning another ring while he's on the team. Yes, he made that great one-handed over the shoulder catch but for every one of those there are five or six "why-didn't-you-catch-that"s. Brady needs to forget about the long ball down the sidelines to Moss and get back to some clean, basic football. Dance with the one that brung ya, Tom.

What's wrong with short little dink and dunk passes right over the middle or a screen pass now and then? And smash mouth defense. Damn I miss Willie Mac, Bruschi and Johnson in their heyday. And Milloy and Law at corner when they were young. Give me the good old days of strong defense and conservative, efficient offense.

There isn't much good sports news in New England right now. Yeah Lester pitched a hell of a game about seven games after it stopped mattering. The Pats looked good for the first half of their last two games. Special teams did its job. And that's about it.

And the Oscar Goes To......

2010-09-18T06:31:00.000-07:00

Yes the Rays-Yankees series was technically important to Red Sox Nation on the off chance that the Yankees would sweep the Rays and the Sox could do something that resembled making a run for the wild card....you know until they lost to Toronto. Toronto??? It's more likely that Tampa Bay will fall into a sinkhole and take its team with it and the entire Yankees organization will succumb to smallpox, thus positioning Boston to possibly make it past the first round of the playoffs but hey, hope is what keeps us New Englanders going.

Still, despite the fact that first base is now the MLB's version of an Academy Award (yes Derek, I'm talking to you) the Rays managed to take the series and the Sox managed to lose to the Blue Jays (did I mention that already?) and the rankings are more or less where everybody thought they'd be come mid-September. Anyway, it's football season for me now.

Speaking of football, Maroney is gone which makes me happy. The fact that the Pats got basically nothing for him doesn't even register with me, he wasn't doing anything anyway so no harm, no foul. If our offense looks as good as it did last week then 2009's best defense shouldn't be a problem. Besides, I loathe Rex Ryan, isn't that reason enough for the Jets to lose?

We Thank You, Lord, for Wes Welker

2010-09-12T17:00:00.000-07:00

The existence of Wes Welker (8 catches for 64 yards) is ample proof, if any more were needed, that God is alive and well and loves New England. Great games by Tom Brady (25 of 35 for 258 yards and three touchdowns, two to Welker), Gary Guyton (59-yard interception return) and Brandon Tate (97-yard runback of the second-half kickoff) remove what little doubt could possibly remain that Foxborough is the fabled city on the hill. At least for Week One of the 2010 season.

Winning is always the primary goal but any time that T.O. and Ochocinco (who've nicknamed themselves Batman and Robin because apparently no amount of attention or self-promotion is enough) are reduced to irrelevance, I can't help but be glad that football season is finally here.

You can't start a fire without a spark

2010-09-05T09:11:00.000-07:00

The Red Sox are done. I believe they've given up and I think most of the fans have too. You just can't fight for your play-off life when the fire has gone out of your belly. It's bad enough to lose to any team Manny Ramirez is on twice in one day, but to do it because you mailed it in two weeks ago is another story.

I know a lot of it can't be helped, 20 starters on the DL isn't doing the Sox any good, but since the All-Star break there haven't been any creative line up changes, any significant additions to the roster, anyone stepping up and into the void to show what he can do now that he's been given the chance. They've looked exactly like what they are: a triple A team playing in the big leagues. Actually, if you look at it that way, it doesn't seem as bad.

Josh Beckett has four wins, all against under .500 teams. That's the kind of year it's been. You now have my permission to find something else to do in October. I know what I'll be doing: praying that the Pats' defense is better than it looks.

Some Things Never Change

2010-08-30T05:43:00.000-07:00

There are many reasons why I don't miss Manny Ramirez and he just reminded me of most of them. In a stunning display of exaggerated self-importance, Manny got himself thrown out of Sunday's game, his last as a Dodger, after a single pitch as a pinch hitter. Unlike my husband, I wasn't the slightest bit sorry to see Manny go and to me, he is exactly today what he has always been: a spoiled little brat who throws his toys out of the playpen the moment he doesn't get his way. You're too old Manny, too old to act like an infant and too old to play games with your contract much longer. Your halcyon days are behind you.

He's going on to the White Sox now and they're welcome to him. Just so long as the socks I never see him in again are red, I'll be happy.

Take This Job and Shove It

2010-08-25T09:29:00.000-07:00

It looks like Johnny Damon won't be gracing the Boston "fans" with his presence after all. He says they like him in Detroit. I don't know what went down in the front office or the locker room when Johnny left Fenway but it must have been pretty memorable. Or maybe not. Maybe he knows he just won't get the money or the contract he wants out of Boston. Either way it's kind of a shame, but hey, at least they like him in Detroit, and at the end of the day who doesn't want to be liked?

Johnny Damon

2010-08-23T19:51:00.000-07:00

So Johnny Damon has been claimed on waivers by the Red Sox. It remains to be seen how this plays out but I'd love to see him back in Fenway. Still, every time I see him I think of the best sign I've ever seen written by a fan and displayed on the first day Damon played at Fenway in Yankee pinstripes:

"Looks Like Jesus

Acts Like Judas

Throws Like Mary".

Never Question The Bill.

2009-03-17T04:31:00.000-07:00

With the rumour mill whirling into overtime about a possible Julius Peppers-to-New-England deal in the works, we mortals have to sit back once again and ask ourselves, "Why do we question The Bill?" Sure, it seemed odd to let Matt Cassell and Mike Vrabel go to Kansas City for so little in return. A second round draft pick for one of the league's most promising young quarterbacks and a seasoned, accomplished veteran of Vrabel's stature? Why would The Bill do that? Was he just doing a favor for his buddy Scott Pioli, now firmly entrenched in the Chiefs' front office?

If the Julius Peppers deal turns out to be true (and all signs indicate that it is) New Englanders far and wide will sit back in starry eyed admiration (with just a hint of unhealthy obsession) aimed at The Bill, wondering how we could ever have doubted him. Turns out that draft pick is a pretty important component of whatever deal the Panthers claim is not taking place.

I said it to my husband and I will say it to anyone who will listen: If you don't understand by now that we are safe and secure in the hands of The Bill, then you never will.

Red Sox News

2009-02-24T19:24:00.000-08:00

Jacoby Ellsbury is reportedly eager to play every day for the Sox this year and I hope we see that. On the subject of things I don't want to see, Julio Lugo is trying to get his job back as the Sox' starting short stop. I don't know what it is with these so-called superstar short stops but none of them seem to be worth the money. (Remember Renteria?)

Six Red Sox players are headed to the World Baseball Classic in a few days: Daisuke Matsuzaka (Japan), Jason Bay (Canada), David Ortiz (Dominican Republic), Dustin Pedroia (United States), Kevin Youkilis (United States) and Javier Lopez (Puerto Rico). Let's hope there are no injuries and I'll be rooting for Youk and Pedroia.

I'm ready for spring, I'm ready for baseball and I'm ready for a full season without Manny Ramirez.