"Called up my Mama said 'I'm in love with a Stripper, yo!'"

Hahaha - I am not surprised AT ALL by the news of A-Fraud cheating on his wife. Actually I wouldn't be surprised to find out my beloved VTek cheats on his wife, because such is the life of a professional athelete. I'm not saying they all do it, it just wouldn't surprise me to learn they do. Does that make sense?

Anyway, NY Post is reporting the story on Stray-Rod. At least he's found a way to deal with his crippling depression. Haha.

Follow @SoxyLady

Welcome back, Trotter!

I've had the pleasure of seeing Trot's last game at Fenway as a Red Sox player:



As well as his return to Fenway as a member of the Tribe:



I've gotta say - I miss the Dirt Dog. There were some great signs (will try and post a pic of my favorite one tonight) and lots of Nixon jerseys in the park.

Follow @SoxyLady

Ashamed

I'm ashamed at my lack of blogging recently, but let me tell ya' Soxy Fans...life has been busy for this Lady! I've had requests to come back, and I will be. That I promise you.GOOOO SOOOXXXX!!!!

Follow @SoxyLady

Grumpy Lady

My first two Sox games of the season have been rained out.

I was supposed to be at the game on the 12th against the Mariners, as well as the game yesterday (my birthday!) against the Angels - In addition to missing the game, I've missed seeing my name on the scoreboard as my VERY thoughtful boyfriend paid to have it there yesterday.

I still have two games this month. The 22nd Yankee game and the game in Baltimore on the 26th. The thing is, I don't know who will be pitching now. I was supposed to be seeing Daisuke. With my luck, it will be Tavarez. Time for me to call the Wah-mbulance.

Follow @SoxyLady

Dear Red Sox Offense,

Please. Please. Please realize you need to provide your phenomenal pitching rotation with some run support. You can't expect a pitcher, such as Tim Wakefield, to only give up one earned run and still lose. This is bringing back bad memories of the 2006 season.

Let's get it started offense, light those bats up!

Sincerely,
Soxy Lady

Follow @SoxyLady

Dice-KKKKKKKKKK

I haven't read my daily blogs yet and have tried to stay away from any form of news before I wrote my Daisuke update. I can image this is what everyone has been fosuing on, and rightly so. The kid didn't do us wrong, infact he was pretty darn good.

I'm really looking forward to watching him develop as an MLB pitcher this year. If you weren't able to see any of the game, check out ESPN's video highlights of Daisuke's debut.

(photo courtesy of the AP)

Matsuzaka went 7 innings and gave up 6 hits and 1 run. He had 10 strike outs (1 less than the Red Sox rookie debut record), walked only one and threw 108 pitches - 74 for strikes. Most impressive was the 4th inning where he struck out the side on 14 (I think) pitches. Even though he got in bit of trouble in the 1st (which he got out of by turning a double play) and gave up a DeJesus homerun, the Sox came out on top 7-1.

I think fans who were there got to see the first game of a Red Sox legend. Too easy to make those comments? I'm wishful. Apparently we could have all been at the game. We should have banded together and chartered a plane, according to this Boston.com article, it still would have been cheaper than us spending a day at Fenway!

On another note - The Daisuke Nike Commercial is great. I love it, almost as much as I love the beer commercial. Thank goodness for the Internet so we're all able to see stuff like this whenever we want.

Something else which deserves mention is Jon Lester's performance yesterday.

Lester made his first start of the year Thursday night for the Class-A Greenville Drive as he attempts to return to Boston's rotation after an offseason of cancer treatments and uncertainty. He shut out the New York Yankees' affiliate, the Charleston RiverDogs, on two hits over four innings before coming out.

When Lester left the game, he thought he had allowed only one hit, but afterward the official scorer ruled that Mitch Hilligoss' hard shot at Greenville third baseman Manny Arambarris was a hit. The scorer originally said Hilligoss reached base on an error.

I think it's safe to say we all wish Lester well and are excited about tracking his progress.

I'm listening to the Sox game at Texas. It's only the third inning, but....

Dear Dougie,

For the love of God. Please cut us a break.

Love,
Soxy Lady

Follow @SoxyLady

Red Sox vs. Kansas City - Game 2

1st Inning
8:10 - I still need to get used to seeing Lugo in a Red Sox uniform. For a guy who was supposed to bring a hot bat to the team, going 1-4 (opening day) and 0-1 (so far tonight) doesn't thrill me. I know, it's only the BEGINNING of the second game. Patience my dear Soxy Lady! I don't know why I am expecting miracles from the start. Afterall both Manny, Tek and Coco are 0-4
8:12 - Youk flies out to right field
8:14 - Papi walks, lets see what Manny can do...
8:15 - Line drive to left field! Yay Manny!
8:16 - "Lets go Red Sox" man, how I've missed that chant. Yes, I watched the game Monday night, but I was in a bar and couldn't hear the fans. JD Drew, RBI double down the right field line. 1-0 Sox!
8:19 - RBI double down the left field line for Mike Lowell! 3-0 Sox! Ok, Tek come on....do something here!
8:23 - Guess I should have been more specific, I didn't mean for Tek to fly out to center. But he did get a good piece of the ball. We should be thankful for that, at least.
-----
8:28 - Beckett gives up a walk to DeJesus
8:31 - 5-4-3 double play!
8:32 - followed by a double...
8:34 - and Beckett gets out of the inning by a 3-0 pop up to right field. End of inning pitch count 18.

2nd Inning
8:39 - Coco stikes out looking
8:40 - Pedroia flies out to right
8:42 - 5-3 ground out for Lugo. 1 for 6 in the season
---
8:46 - 1st strikeout of the night for Josh
8:52 - Ground out, two out walk and eventually a fly out. Beckett is throwing a lot of balls. I'd be curious to find out what his ball to strike ratio is. Important thing is that the score is still 3-0, good guys.

3rd Inning
8:56 - Youk grounds out. They didn't show him walking back to the dugout, I wonder if he was cursing at himself....cracks me up when he does that. **Edit: It was the top of the 9th and we are ahead 7-1 and Youk strikes out and screams "FU(K!!!" afterwards. Calm down dude, we won...you had a decent game, helluva homer. Let this one go.
8:56 - Quick pop out for Papi
8:58 - Strike three called on Manny.
---
OK, so you know how earlier how I said I wasn't sure live blogging was my "thing?" Well, I am sure now. It's not my thing. I might make some periodic comments during the game. But not this batter by batter thing. It's a snore-fest to write so I'm sure it's as boring to read.

One thing I have to mention is that Mike Lowell just got back to back errors. I can't believe it! He only had six errors in all of last season! Poor Lowell and he was having a good offensive game. I hope this doesn't set him off for the rest of the game. **Edit: Make that three errors on the game. Bottom of the 9th, two outs Lowell gets a routine 5-3 ball and short hops it to first. OK, well I'm going to try and put this behind me like I'm going to try and put Curt's opening day behind me.

Jerry did give some comic relief in the top of the seventh..momentarily forgetting to call the game when he drew a diagram on some poor shirtless Royal's fan chest...advising him where to groom his chest hair. He called it "manscaping" and compared him to Austin Powers - Good times, I missed Jerry. In the middle of the inning they went back to the guy, showing his back hair and where it conntects to his chest hair. I love when they get bored. Don said it's like he's wearing a carpet and even though he's shirtless in the 30-some-odd degree weather, he's surely warm.

Sox win 7-1.

Follow @SoxyLady

Brrrrrr.....

Where did this cold weather (both here in the Boston area and in Kansas City!) come from? Snow in April? I do not approve!

Beckett is getting his '07 start tonight and there is a lot of hype around it. This is supposed to be "his" year - forget Dice K, people are saying Josh will be our star pitcher. Let's hope that starts with tonight. I have yet to decide if I'll live blog or not during the game. I'm not really sure it's my thing.

I also want to send best wishes to Jon Lester who will be starting tomorrow night with the Greenville Drive, under manager Gabe Kapler! If things go well with Jon, we could be seeing him as soon as May in a Boston uniform! I can only hope I'll be there for that reception when it happens :o)

GO SOX

Follow @SoxyLady

I <3 Opening Day

There is Opening Day of Baseball (today)...
Opening Day, the Sox first game (tomorrow)
and
Opening Day at Fenway Park on April 10th. I love and am excited about them all!

I started my new job last week, and you can imagine my delight when I found a Tek cut-out in one of the conference rooms. I also learned that the company will be closing early tomorrow, so all of us can head down to the bar to watch the game! Woooo hooooo! My company rocks!

While I don't have tickets to any of these games, I do for the Seattle game on the 12th (the last game in the home opener series).

---------------------------------

I was going to take this opportunity to write a letter to my dear Jason Varitek but while browsing around I found Kristen already wrote a pretty solid one. For that, I am also adding her to my daily reads. It will be nice to celebrate in Tek's success this season, right? I said SUCCESS!

---------------------------------

Also, my fantasy baseball draft was today. I think my team is OK. I give it a 6.5/10 - what do you think?

Follow @SoxyLady

Sorry Mr. Red Sox

First and foremost, I want to say I truly feel sorry for Johnny Pesky. The Red Sox have been his life for longer than I have been alive. I feel he brings joy to the players and to the fans, and that he really is humbled by how much we love him for his presence.
(photo courtesy of id10t's flickr page)

By now you probably know that MLB is going to be enforcing a rule that limits the number of coaches allowed in uniform (Read the Boston.com story). What this means is the iconic presence of Johnny Pesky will no longer be allowed in the Sox dugout during games.

At first I was really angry. I love baseball. I do NOT love MLB. In fact, I think it's fair to say I loathe MLB. I took this latest news as another blow to the fans. But the more and more I thought about it, I can't find a legitimate reason why Pesky should be allowed to stay. Nothing more than sentiment. I'm a very sentimental person, so seeing him in a Red Sox uniform, in the dugout brings a lot. I love mixing the history of the club. But who's to say tomorrow 15
former Red Sox legends won't approach the Front Office and say they also want to sit in the dugout during games?

That being said, I understand limiting the number of people allowed in the dugout. Can't they make some sort of grandfather clause for Pesky? I don't know. How would I feel if this wasn't my team...if it was a Yankees figure they were talking about "tossing" - I'd probably be happy about it. I need to try and be objective.

The real question becomes WHY?

Some people are saying they are protecting Pesky's safety. Wasn't it last year (or two years ago?) That he got hit during spring training? He may be 87 years old, but he knows the risk he is taking. If it was all about worrying whether or not he'd get hurt, why don't they make pitchers wear masks in case they get hit in the head (we remember the Clement situation all too well)? Why don't they make outfielders wear padding in case they run into each other in the outfield or into walls trying to make a play (Hello, Demon!)? And if that was the only issue, it's nothing that couldn't get resolved by a waiver. There are fences up in front of the dugouts now..I don't know. He could also get hit by a foul ball sitting in the owners box during a game. I just can't justify that as the reason.

Others say it give the Sox (or whatever other team) an unfair advantage having another pair of eyes on the bench. That this extra person would be able to pick up signs others may have missed, blah blah blah....So when is MLB going to ban fans from sitting in the stands during games? Do they honestly think teams doesn't have "spies" situated throughout the park? There is a such thing as cell phones. Crap. Total crap.

So while I don't like the enforcement of this particular rule with my particular team, rules are rules. Sometimes is sucks, but you just gotta suck it up. Pesky, I love ya' and I'm sorry this has happened. Hopefully the FO can come up with some sort of resolution.

Follow @SoxyLady