Anyone Surprised?/LOWELL

Why?? Player, Club	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	10th	Points
Alex Rodriguez, NYY	26	2									328
Magglio Ordonez, DET	2	22	4								258
Vladimir Guerrero, LAA		3	10	9	3	3					203
David Ortiz, BOS		1	11	6	3		3	2	1		177
Mike Lowell, BOS			1	6	2	7	4	3	2		126
Jorge Posada, NYY				3	4	6	6	3	1	2	112
Victor Martinez, CLE				1	7	5	4	2	3	1	103
Ichiro Suzuki, SEA				1	6	2	5	3	3	1	89
Carlos Pena, TB			2			2	2	3	8	5	64
Curtis Granderson, DET				1	2	1		5	1	10	51
Derek Jeter, NYY					1	1	1		1		17
Grady Sizemore, CLE						1		1	3	1	15
J.J. Putz, SEA				1				1	1		12
C.C. Sabathia, CLE							1	1	2		11
Torii Hunter, MIN								1	1		5
Orlando Cabrera, LAA								1		2	5
Bobby Abreu, NYY							1				4
John Lackey, LAA							1				4
Placido Polanco, DET								1		1	4
Justin Morneau, MIN								1			3
Chone Figgins, LAA									1	1	3
Josh Beckett, BOS										2	2
Fausto Carmona, CLE										1	1
Frank Thomas, TOR										1	1

Do you all see where Lowell finished? Behind Ortiz, who I didn't even consider. Vlad? I love ya, but you are not the MVP. Ordonez? Who? A-Rod? But I don't like him!

Why don't they ask me before they make these decisions?

Actually, I'm somewhat happy Lowell finished so high. I didn't think anyone but me (and the fans in the stands during that one postseason game) thought he should be MVP.

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More important than that award, Mike Lowell will be back!! For 3 years!! YAY!

Multiple news outlets -- including ESPN.com, the Boston Herald and the Boston Globe -- reported on Monday afternoon that Lowell and the Red Sox have agreed in principle on a three-year deal that is believed to be worth between $36-$38 million.

They won't announce it until tomorrow, but we all know it now--things are right in Boston.

Yay!!!!!

Mikey Lowell Stuff

I had another one of those Red Sox nightmares last night: Mike Lowell was a Yankee.

Thankfully, I have more faith in Lowell than I did in Damon, and I don't think Mike would do that. He seems a little less...umm...stupid, than Damon (can't think of a better word?). Plus, my dreams never mean anything (the night before last, I dreamt I was about to be killed by Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th before I convinced him we would make a good team, I'd break into houses and he would do his thing. I'm a weird bird).

So there's not much to tell, just Theo meeting with people and attempting to get some deals done. Every day I come home and hope Lowell has agreed to stay with us another year or so, and so far I've been disappointed. It will happen though. Maybe on the same day he is announced MVP!

Schilling's Back

Curt Schilling signed a one-year deal worth $8 million that could be worth as much as $14 million should he reach all the incentives in the package. That's good, hopefully he will have another good year...but maybe with a better win-loss record.

In other news, Kevin Youkilis won a Gold Glove for his awesomeness at first base. It was expected and totally deserved. He only had like 429088 consecutive error-free games...or something like that. Where is Lowell's, though?

Days I'm looking forward to:
11/12: Pedroia wins AL Rookie of the Year
11/13: Beckett wins the AL Cy Young
11/14: Lowell wins AL MVP

Yes, they will all win. Well, they SHOULD.

The Parade

Today was the day when thousands of Red Sox fans waited along the streets of Boston to catch a glimpse of their favorite team as they rolled on by to thank the fans and celebrate with them. As always, I have many pictures to document the parade (there are way too many but I couldn't stop, they were all too good):

Something tells me Papelbon is a really fun guy to hang out with:

I was going to caption this one with something about how cool it would be to be on one of these flights, but I'm so distracted by the size of Varitek's arms...huge!

Love this kid:And I want his jersey!

More Papelbon being awesome:

Who doesn't love Don?

Gotta have a picture of the man, David Ortiz:

And the man that gave America free tacos eats his!

Love the Pedroia:

Our fearless leader:

Some pitchers for your viewing pleasure:

More Papelbon (never enough!):

And the best of them all, Varitek holding the "Resign Lowell" sign:

As far as actual news goes, there's Schilling writing goodbye letters to his teammates and filing for free agency. "There's a very realistic chance I won't ever play with them again."

It's too soon to think about all that. Can we just think about winning the World Series for the next few weeks? Slow it down, the game was only a couple days ago and they're already talking about next year!

Does it Get Any Better?

It's still true the next day -- the Boston Red Sox totally won the World Series last night.

I know anything I say right now can't capture the moment we all experienced last night when our team won their 2nd title in 4 years, but I'll try! My favorite part about the postseason, and really the whole year, was that this was such a team effort. Of course, we have the big names, Ortiz, Ramirez, Beckett...but even when they weren't awesome (well, Beckett was always awesome), the rest of the team came through and got hits and RBIs. Even trying to figure out who the MVP was, I couldn't really decide on anyone because they all contributed in their own way. But hearing it was Lowell, well, it made sense (especially since he should be the AL MVP and won't get it).

I think the Globe front page says it all--they are the best, and they certainly proved it these past few weeks. Down but never out, that's who they are. Man, am I going to miss this season...and this team, because you know it won't look the same come spring training. So let's enjoy it while we can....and bask in the knowledge that WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS!!!

The AL Pennant is Back Home

Five minutes ago, the only thing I remembered about winning the AL pennant last night was I was sick for the majority of the game.

With a little prodding though, I now recall Pedroia being incredibly awesome; Beckett getting the most deserved MVP award ever; 3 people holding up MVP signs when Lowell was up, thus proving I am not the only one who thinks Lowell is the AL MVP; Papelbon's excited/exuberant/a little scary face when Crisp caught that last ball; Matsuzaka doing better than I'd expected/hoped.

What a night.

That game literally had me ill for the most part, even though we always had the lead and I felt the whole day that we would win, it was still very uncomfortable to watch. Anything can happen in baseball. And when Okajima stayed in 2 batters longer than I wanted, I started feeling the sickness hard...and then Papelbon came in and I was 100% better. Where would we be without him?!

Actually, where would we be without everyone on this team? Ortiz and Manny were hot the first few games and when their production decreased a bit, the bottom half stepped it up and played great. This is a well-rounded team that totally deserves to be where they are now.

Next up, a World Series win. I don't think those Rockies stand a chance.

Now for the pictures!

Oh yeah, Millar was there in the beginning! What a great way to start the game.

I'm so glad to have this picture--we saw this sign last night and thought it was great. So many clever Boston fans!

A great one for those dumb towel-waving Cleveland people. The man holding the sign had a great line: "We're not a bunch of towel waving geeks..Don't wave a white towel unless you are surrendering."

I'm throwing this one in here just because Harold Reynolds is in it and I miss him!!

What the hell kind of Red Sox wife doesn't wear a Red Sox shirt?


See ya Wednesday!!

Oh, Gagne

I am sure Eric Gagne is a very nice man.

I bet he is a lot of things, actually: maybe he can cook, maybe he's a really good dad, maybe he does a lot of charity work..

But I know one thing he can't do: close games. Wait, close games in a GOOD way.

It's a 6-6 game. Each team has played really well, actually, clawing their way back whenever they've been down. Papelbon has pitched more than he's pitched at any one time the whole season. Who is left in the bullpen? Eric Gagne, Javier Lopez, and Jon Lester. Who is the one man you don't pick in a 6-6 game in the 11th inning? Gagne. Who did Francona pick? Gagne.

He got one out, and I was thinking maybe I shouldn't have been so hard on him. Then Grady Sizemore swung his bat and from there, everything came crashing down. By the time Lopez came in to relieve Gagne, it was way, WAY too late.

I don't know. I feel bad for him, since he knows that every time the fans see him come in, we know we're gonna lose. He must feel like crap right now, I'm sure it isn't easy being called on in the 11th, knowing you haven't been throwing your best stuff for months now. But something has to happen to make him the way he used to be. He's like the Alex Rodriguez of Boston: get in a must-win situation for a major team in the playoffs and he chokes.

One thing I did NOT like last night: the booing. People, I know he sucked and he blew the game but you must not boo! That is certainly not how fans react to struggling players (and yes, I realize he's been struggling since he came to Boston), and the booing DOES NOT HELP.

By the way, Curt Schilling was so not great last night. A better outing from him would have gone a long way. The 3-run HR, that we could have done without. And I don't want to overlook Ortiz' hustle to get to 1st, followed by a Manny home run and a Lowell home run that without, we wouldn't have even gone to extra innings. So kudos to them, sorry it ended the way it did. And they were all so happy until the end...

A Nice Game for Us

Top of the 3rd -- Oakland has bases loaded. They score 1 run.

Bottom of the 3rd -- Boston has bases loaded. They score 3 runs.

Who had 2 of those RBIs? Mike Lowell is one of the best things that has ever happened to this team.

RBIs all over the place with him!

The 4th inning saw us down 4-3, but then Manny and Lowell got us back on top 5-4. How happy are we to have Manny back and Lowell being his usual awesome self?

But then it was 5-5 an inning later.

Of course, my favorite player Pedroia (or DP, as I prefer to call him) broke the tie with a home run :) Manny walked, Ortiz doubled, Mike Lowell hit the wall AGAIN and that was TWO MORE RBIs!

Lowell should be the AL MVP, seriously.

But the inning wasn't over because Drew hit one right to the center fielder Nick Swisher who totally missed it, Lowell went to 3rd on the play, and Drew ended up at 2nd. Still no outs! Youkilis walked, and Varitek struck out (not surprised). Ellsbury grounded out but Lowell scored on the play. Lugo made his out and we ended up with a 9-5 lead. 2 more unanswered runs in the 7th, nothing in the 8th, and then the 9th was over and we won.

That was a great game. Every time Oakland got the lead or tied it, we got the lead right back, then ran away with it towards the end. Loved it.

A Loss is Never Good

Another loss. After the extra innings mess that went down yesterday, a win would have been nice -- but now they all have a few days to recover, as they don't play again until Thursday to start a series against Toronto. But not everyone...

"Following the game, Ramirez boarded principal owner John W. Henry's private plane, along with David Ortiz, Mike Lowell, Josh Beckett, Jonathan Papelbon and Hideki Okajima, on a flight to the West Coast."

Look at all those Sox players! Doing us proud.

P.S. My other tennis team won today and we are going to the playoffs. So at least one good thing happened today (in addition to Federer beating Nadal, of course. Too bad about that Djokovic kid, I really wanted to see him in the finals!).

Huge Lead

It's like 13-2 up in Boston, and we are on the good side of that score. There is NO WAY they can blow this. NO WAY. And with All-Star Okajima in that bullpen, it's an even safer lead.

Coco Crisp hit a grand slam earlier, which is awesome. Mike Lowell hit a 3-run HR over the Green Monster, and he's got 4 RBI, Crisp has 5, and everything is going quite smoothly. If only all the games could be like this!

How Different

What a difference a few hours makes.

We won the first game today 13-3, with a Mike Lowell grand slam (!) and a fantastic pitching performance by Matsuzaka (8 IP, 3 ER). Over his last three starts, Matsuzaka is 3-0 with a 1.87 ERA. Oh yeah, and Lugo, Wily Mo, and Youkilis also had HRs in the game.

And then came the second game. Hansack started and gave up 4 over 4 innings. Not that bad. Then Pineiro came in and gave up 4 in 2. And Lopez allowed 3 in only one measly inning of work. Romero tried to end the bleeding, and he did, for one inning. But Donnelly came in after that to pitch the 9th, and totally gave up 3 runs. BULLPEN '06 RETURNS. We lost, embarrassingly, 14-0.

Those Yankees lost again - in awesome fashion. Johnny Damon pushed a non-HR ball into HR territory. Cano made 3 errors (though I kinda like that kid and do feel bad for him - he actually threw one ball off his foot after making a really good stop). Jeter was very un-clutch. Another one of their pitchers didn't make it through the first inning, though I can't be too happy about this one because Rasner ended up with a fractured finger. They have some BAD luck lately, somewhat reminiscent of a certain team from Boston late last season.

Keep it Up

What's this I see? Another Boston victory? And it was a beatdown as well? 9-3! And the best part is it was Matsuzaka pitching - 7 innings, 5 hits, 1 run. MUCH better!! Maybe he is finally getting in a groove.

A lot of HRs from our team tonight: Ortiz, Lugo, Manny, Lowell. I love it when the HR Bug bites these guys. Papi was 4-for-5 tonight, Pedroia was 2-for-4, and Lowell was 3-for-4. I hope it's like this forever and no one gets hurt to screw it up.

The Curt Schilling comments and subsequent apology? He says things all the time, you have to learn when to ignore and when to pay attention. Francona thought it was important, but me? I just ignore, ignore, ignore until I hear Bronson's name, or Trot's. I miss them.

They Must End

I so wanted 8 losses in a row, but I guess all things that are fantastic must end eventually. But it would have been nice if NY's losing streak had ended after the Boston series.

Of course, after I mentioned the fact that NY had no saves yesterday, they had to get one today. I should keep my mouth shut about those things!

Even though Boston's offense was quite bad (so many, MANY chances to score all blown), there's always tomorrow. And those bats better be on fire tomorrow, since Julian Tavarez will take the mound against Wang. And we are still in first place, and NY is still in last. Things are as they should be.

And what was with Mike Lowell's errors today? Both when Jeter hit the ball right to him! Time to fix whatever the problem was there.

Today I saw a picture and suddenly realized what all the Yankee fans are truly thinking when they see Manny. I thought, since I am so enlightened now, I shall share with my wonderful readers:

Mistake of the (Yester)Day: Mentioning Coco's bad hair. Because now it's even worse!

Happy Birthday Tito, From Manny, J.D., Mike, & Jason

First inning - uh-oh. Matsuzaka got his first 2 outs, then struck out Abreu twice but he was walked because the crazy umpire called those strikes balls. So it ended up being 2-0 and things really didn't look good.

But um, WOW we were down 3-0 then Manny hit a home run, followed by J.D. Drew, then Lowell, then Varitek ALL IN A ROW! In 5 minutes we went from 3-0 to 4-3. When Varitek was up my mom said, "Aww, he won't get one," and I replied, "He got one the other night!" then he proceeded to kill one way over left field. Then I started to feel a little bad for the pitcher kid but... oh well. That was pretty damn exciting. First time in team history that 4 home runs in a row were hit. WOW. My mom and I were just laughing. Man, I wish that happened more often. It's too bad I can't get a picture of Manny's reaction - he was smiling and laughing and hugging people :)

But then Matsuzaka killed the mood by giving up a double to Mient-traitor-kiewicz. And I checked to see if I spelled his name right and I cannot believe I still remember how to spell that craziness. But hey, I did win a bunch of spelling bees in elementary school :) By the way, Matsuzaka did get out of that jam. But in the 5th, he gave up a solo shot to Take-a-Seater and it was 4-4. He also struck out A-Rod for the second time. But later on he did give up another run and we were down by one.

Things got interesting in the 7th when Manny led off with a single and Drew doubled off the wall. Then they got more than just interesting when Mike Lowell hit his 2nd HR of the game, off the top of the wall, to make it 7-5!

Daisuke went 7+ innings before Hideki Okajima came in to try and continue his Yankee dominance. Matsuzaka wasn't spectacular, but he wasn't bad either. I imagine he was pretty nervous, actually. H.O. got one out then gave up a single to get men on 1st and 2nd. And then he walked the bases loaded with only one out. I think maybe he had been used too much. In came Donnelly, and it looked like he might get a double play but Cairo screwed up Lugo's throw and we only got one out and a run scored. 7-6. And then Dustin Pedroia displayed his sweet defense and made a beautiful, BEAUTIFUL diving catch. It was so nice. And just to say, Pedroia had a pretty good night tonight, offense and defense. I like what I'm seeing. <--- I had actually typed that even BEFORE he made the freaking awesome catch to get out of the 8th. Yeah, he should have a good year.

Mr. Papelbon pitched the 9th. Got Damon to fly out, Jeter struck out (ha!), and Abreu walked. Eek. So Rodriguez was up, but he was no trouble at all. Another spectacular performance by Papelbon.

First time in 17 years the Sox swept the Yanks at home.

Get out the brooms!