If I hear that 'Had a bad Day' song one more time today, I'll pull a Tavarez

Sometimes you just have to take your beat downs …

Marty:
Ah, nothing quite like being disgraced in a nationally televised game is there Billy boy?

 

---

Bill:
Yeah, you'd know best, Mahty, seeing how you've seen your share of that the past half dozen years or so, eh?

 

---

Marty:
Thing is Callaghan, while your team and fans seem content to cling to one infinitesimal blip in history, and seem perfectly willing to slide back into your "wait until next year" submissiveness, the Yanks are out there making things happen.

 

---

Bill:
Is that so, Mahty?

 

---

Marty:
You know it, Billy. You're whole sham is perfectly symbolized by the world's worst actor cum world's most famous Red Sox fan Ben Affleck pulling back like a sissy in his box seats letting the Angels' first baseman just reach in unchallenged to snag a foul out. You wouldn't see that from Yanks fans at The Stadium.

 

---

Bill:
-------?!?!

 

---

Unknown Yankees fan:
Face the music. You guys just have no fight, no, how you say it, "desiah."

 

---

Unknown Yankees fan:
And fercrissakes can we finally put to rest any claims that Theo Epstein is a better GM than Cashman?

 

---

Bill:
Don't you mean "cash" sans man?

 

---

Unknown Yankees fan:
How predictable. Always the money, always the "pity us we were outspent" sorry-assed whine. But the truth is while your Boy Wonder had his hands on his guitar neck worrying about his next rock and roll benefit and is going around whimpering how this is a bad year for trades, my man Cashman goes out and gets Abreu and Lidle for a steal.

 

---

Bill:
Hey, we got Bryan Corey.

 

---

Unknown Yankees fan:
Heh heh. Glad to see you've still got a sense of humor about your sinking Sawx ship, Bill. That'll come in handy come September when you finally hit bottom.

 

---

Unknown Yankees fan:
Oh, and you did see that Johnny Damon went upper deck twice yesterday, right, Bill? Bill?

 

---

For the rest of the day …

Bill:
Grrrrrr…

 

---

Making everything beautiful in its time

Scene from a church:
For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven.

 

---

Father Tim:
… a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up

 

---

Father Tim:
a time to play the 3-4 defensive switch, and a time for Big Papi to defy it

 

---

Trading deadline time again

Bill:
I know Theo's not a miracle workah, yet every morning as the trading deadline approaches I wake up expecting to read how the boy wondah orchestrated some jaw dropping mega deal and I'm disappointed to realize it hasn't happened.

 

---

Mike:
See, that's exactly what I don't like about this time of year. The trading deadline gets everyone jacked up thinking a trade must happen and if a trade doesn't materialize it's seen as some sort of failure.

 

---

Mike:
I mean it's a cliche worth repeating: sometimes the best trade is no trade at all.

 

---

Bill:
Yeah, yeah, but do you really want to go into August riding on the hope that Wells is going to recovah and bolstah the rotation?

 

---

Mike:
Hahdly, but what's the alternative? Give up future prospects for one of the so-so stahtahs available with no guarantee they'll be much help?

 

---

Bill:
True. It'd be easier to find a straight dude in a boy band than to swing a down low deal for pitching in this mahket.

 

---

Mike:
Absolutely. Meanwhile, let your trade deadline addled mind consider this: In the case of the Red Sox, the number 1 and 2 stahtahs have combined for a 26-8 record, 18 games ovah .500. The club, itself, is only 21 games ovah. Two starting pitchers who can win two-thirds of their stahts, supported by a .500 stahtah and two .450-startahs, will get a club pretty fah, about 89 wins. A good offense will help push that into contention area.

 

---

Bill:
All right then. Bring on the red hot Halos!

 

---

Beach Blanket Bingo

Mike:
Well, we've officially entered the sphinctah tightening paht of the season.

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, it's that time of the year when the Sox can take two straight from Oakland at Oakland yet, not unexpectedly even, lose the third game behind a journeyman castoff pitcher like Snydah and you feel your nuts start to draw up in fright.

 

---

Mike:
Combine that Sox loss with the Yankees resilience and late inning heroics and you've got Maine ocean watah like shrinkage to the nethahs.

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, and you can read how the Sox have the No. 2 winning percentage in baseball and their best record through 100 games since '79, yet, still, fact is you're sitting on your beach blanket with a one inchah.

 

---

Lines in the Suit

Your omniscient author in absentia:
A last minute business trip has me out of town. Since I have the internets at the hotel, figured I could whip up a strip — But it turns out I can't get my "Soxaholix" head on when I'm not in my usual space/routine.

 

---

Your omniscient author in absentia:
Should be back to normal on Thursday.

 

---

Your omniscient author in absentia:
Meanwhile, a loss is a loss just as much as a win is a win, but I liked the Sox never say die tone in yesterday's game, despite the outcome. What about you?

 

---

Poor Ted

Doug:
So aftah the crazy cryogenic head separation and now the Tunnel of Terror it's like what's next to tahnish the posthumous legacy of Ted Williams?

 

---

Arturo, the hot dog vendor:
It's so sad to have the great Ted Williams name linked to anything branded a failure let along something the kills people.

 

---

Doug:
Memo to the Big Dig engineers: You were working on the Ted Williams Tunnel, you know, Teddy Baseball, the Splendid Splintah, hello, war hero and not the Charles Stuart Tunnel or the Albert Desalvo Tunnel. Have some civic pride fercrissakes.

 

---

Arturo, the hot dog vendor:
Yeah, right now Larry Bird is on the phone with his lawyah, "Hey, put in my will that when I'm dead Boston can't name anything aftah me, OK?"

 

---

Doug:
Meanwhile, I'll take yestahday's win despite a less than shahp Schilling and a less than dominating team effit over the Rangers.

 

---

Arturo, the hot dog vendor:
Sure you can say this homestand was "good, but not great," and demurely trot out the "win is a win" platitudes, but, truth is, a win is a win, and I'll take the ugly wins over the ugly losses any day of the week.

 

---

This mortal coil

Bill:
Hey, a win is a win, as they say, but geez, one friggin run is all they can manage against the Royals with Cheese?

 

---

Doug:
I wish yesterday's offensive famine was a one off, but the Sox have only put 22 runs across the plate since coming off the All Star Break.

 

---

Bill:
Yeah, at this point this offense is as disappeared as that Suri Cruise runt.

 

---

Doug:
Meanwhile, does Tim Wakefield lead some double, secret life or something? I mean how and the fug do you fracture a rib throwing the knuckleball?

 

---

Bill:
Evidently, while it's rare, the stress fracture is overuse injury and occurs when the bone is repetitively stressed without allowing sufficient time for recovery.

 

---

Doug:
Argh. That doesn't sound good. Not good at all.

 

---

Bill:
Hurts me to say it, but we may very well be witnessing the beginning of the end of the Wakefield epoch.

 

---

Doug:
Christ, that's the saddest thought I've heard in awhile. I mean the Red Sox without Wakefield is like a chowdah without potatoes. He's the starch, the filler, the stretcher of of rich flavor.

 

---

Bill:
Agreed. But what can you do? The mortal coil tangles and twists, and knots tightly as the years pass for all of us.

 

---

Doug:
Well, a toast to youth, then, and the promise of Josh Beckett for the next three years.

 

---

It's an open smile on a friendly shore

Steve:
Well, well, well … Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, may I present Mr. Jon Lester.

 

---

Mike:
Of course, we are obligated to dole out the de rigueur cautions … Lestah still struggles with walks, his 5-0 staht has a lot to do with a fabulous defense behind him, and last night he was facing the Royals, a team with no concept of plate discipline.

 

---

Steve:
All true, all true. But the thing is Lester is very young, let's not forget, and every outing he seems to improve.

 

---

Mike:
Absolutely. And then there's this intangible: Lestah is just mofo exciting to watch.

 

---

Steve:
Watching these young guys blossom before our eyes is a different kind of excitement, too. I mean think about it: Lester and Papelbon, two homegrown kids, just combined for a 1-hitter.

 

---

Mike:
Talk about your red skies at night.

 

---

Steve:
We've gone from being passengers in steerage on Titanic to sipping mai tai's on the fiesta deck of the Love Boat.

 

---

Comforter, where is your comforting?

Mike:
Well, that was bit more of a nail biter than I'd have preferred, but bettah late than nevah with the offense.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Definitely the game had one of those must win feels to it, but for me it's overshadowed by Wakefield's bad back.

 

---

Mike:
Seriously, I'm trying to get my head around the possibility of Wake on the DL.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Pitched past pitch of grief …

 

---

Mike:
Is it crazy of me to believe Wells and Clement will be second half heroes?

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Hey, if Yankees' fans can hope that their boy Ponson doesn't go all Kitty Dukakis slugging Scope for the booze hit, then there's no reason we can't have a little optimism about Boomah's knee.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
But Clement? Jeez, I dunno …

 

---

Mike:
Was there really a time when the Red Sox had so much pitching that Bronson Arroyo was mahked as expendable?

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Ah, beautiful Bronson, and the pangs of hindsight.

 

---

Mike:
More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Comforter, where is your comforting?

 

---

Like that time Vanilla Ice "snubbed" the Grammys

Tara:
So much for the warm fuzzy over the 9 more games in the friendly confines in the second half of the season than in the first.

 

---

Bill:
And, right on schedule, our Curly Haired Boyfriend surfaces to remind us that the Yankees haven't gone away.

 

---

Tara:
Like anyone ever thought that. The Yankees rarely ever "go away" and I don't know a serious Red Sox fan who feels otherwise.

 

---

Bill:
And poor Dan-O still hasn't got the memo from 2004. You don't wish the Yankees away. You look 'em in the blue lips and proceed to beat their pinstripped asses.

 

---

Tara:
I love this latest rumor Shaughnasty is trying to peddle that Sidney Ponson "snubbed" the Red Sox.

 

---

Bill:
There's got to be a great laugh line to be found in that, but I think I'm just maxing out my mental RAM just trying to merge the notion of Ponson the fatboy drunk whom even the Orioles abandoned and the notion of snubbing anyone.

 

---

Tara:
Heck, all I know is I wish over the years a lot more has been wash outs had snubbed the Sox as well. Might have saved us a boat load of heartache. Yeah, I'm looking at you Dante Bichette, Steve Avery, Jack Clark, so on and so forth.

 

---

Arrrrh! (A little early for talk like a pirate day, I know, but...)

Bill:
Damn you, Oakland. Damn you and your funny white shoes, too.

 

---

Doug:
This is not the way I want to start a Friday — A Sox loss, the Middle East on the brink of all out war, and, taking tragedy to a new level, I learn Keira Knightley has no tits.

 

---

Bill:
Live by the Photoshop airbrush tool, die by the Photoshop airbrush tool.

 

---

Doug:
Dude, this isn't funny. My wanking fantasy rotation is totally blown. Keira was my skinny yet Godly endowed go to goodnight sleep tight fantasy gal.

 

---

Bill:
C'mon, kiwis or not, are you saying you can't find a place for Keira effin' Knightley in your pen?

 

---

Doug:
No, not at all. But this is going to diminish her role. I'll probably keep her for special situations, a LOOGY, you know?

 

---

Bill:
Life is rough, guy, but people continue to flock in record numbers to the Dead Man's Chest movie.

 

---

Doug:
Fuck Johnny Depp. If I want to see someone in an eye patch, I'll watch my Manny hitting clinic videos.

 

---

Bill:
Seriously, coolest thing I've seen all year is Manny in an eye patch.

 

---

Doug:
You know if/when Manny decides to speak to the media again, I think he should don the eye patch and totally go the pirate talk thing.

 

---

Bill:
Awesome idea. I can see it now …

Reporter: "Manny is it true you have a tear in your meniscus?"

Pirate Manny: "Arrr, you rum soaked drivelswigger. I'll give you a meniscus right in your dungbie. Next question, you in the back, the curly haired scallywag, Arrrr!"

 

---

Coke Heah, Plattah Balls Heah

Mike:
OK, hands down this is the best line of the summah so fah: "I want his balls on a platter."

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, now that's what I call a "soccah mom"!

 

---

Mike:
Heck, and they say kids today only want to sit inside playing Nintendo and looking at porn. Not in these pahts, at least.

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, that's totally throw back teen behaviah.

 

---

Mike:
Of course, now that this story is out, you can bet that'll be end of the shimmy undah the fence stuff.

 

---

Doug:
Well, what do you expect. The Globe is owned by the New York Times. They couldn't keep a secret if lives depended on it.

 

---

Mike:
Meanwhile, you've gotta love this — The All Stah has been in the books for an entiah news cycle now, yet we still have columns in each of the city's papahs discussing Manny's absence from the game and the ominousness of it all.

 

---

Doug:
I wait for the day when Manny's mom comes out and says, "I want their balls on a plattah."

 

---

Mike:
Of course, a plattah is proper overkill in this case. A demitasse saucer would surely do.

 

---

Different strokes for...

Mike:
Didya watch the homah derby?

 

---

Doug:
Naw, I totally take the Manny approach to the All Star Game festivities. It's a chance to take a break and chill a bit in anticipation of the serious half of the season.

 

---

Mike:
Buckley says that Manny and the Red Sox are making a "mockery" of the game.

 

---

Doug:
Whatevah. Buckley also can't help but impugn the fans' intelligence either when he writes, "The Sox are going to get away with this because their millions of fans will believe the bit about getting poor Manny healthy for the stretch run."

 

---

Doug:
Well, Steve boyo, here's one of the millions who doesn't give two shits whethah Manny's knee is truly hurting or not. Wait, let me rephrase that: I certainly hope Manny's knee it not hurting and this is just a ruse to get out of attending.

 

---

Doug:
Call me selfish, call me myopic, call me a Shirley, but I want a rested Manny for the 2nd half.

 

---

Mike:
But what about the millions of baseball fans who went through the trouble to vote for Manny?

 

---

Doug:
Oh, right, all that one minute of mouse clicking of radio buttons. What a grave injustice. Perhaps the fans who feel so put upon should go on a rolling hungah strike in protest?

 

---

Mike:
Hey, all I know is Ted Williams took the All Stah Game seriously and what's good enough for Teddy Baseball is good enough for me.

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, and how many World Series rings did Ted Williams have?

 

---

Mike:
Whoa, dude, don't make me go over there and go all Zidane on your ass. Nobody messes with The Greatest Hitter That Evah Lived. Seriously. I'm not playing.

 

---

Doug:
Hey, I'm just busting balls. You can stop pointing your forehead at me. But, all kidding aside, my point is why isn't it enough to be a Red Sox fan? Why should I have to apologize for not caring about the All Stah Game, for not caring about the World Baseball Classic?

 

---

Doug:
I mean do we all have to be little George Will and Bart Giamatti clones walking around speaking in hushed, reverential toens about the beauty of the game and the noblest expressions of leisure and freedom and all that?

 

---

Mike:
Well, I think there's something to be said for looking at the game of baseball as part of our collective artistic and creative impulse. Sure I do.

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, well, I think there's something to be said for winning pennants. And while the All Star game may have meant something in the 40s, let's just say a lot of things meant something in the 40s that generally don't mean shit today, unfortunately, like being a patriotic war hero for one. I'm just sayin', that's all.

 

---

Remember, there is crying in soccer

Doug:
Did I really just watch a 19 inning baseball game?

 

---

Bill:
Yeah, there's six hours and nineteen minutes of my life I won't get back.

 

---

Doug:
But what the frig, you know, 2 of 3 from the White Sox on the road combined with a Yankees loss yestahday? No complaints heah.

 

---

Bill:
Absolutely. It's been a solid first half. There's a few worries, but we should be all smiles during this break.

 

---

Doug:
I'm also feeling good that the World Cup is ovah for anothah 4 years, there's only so much man-crying I can take.

 

---

Doug:
You know the old saying, éI went to a fight and a hockey game broke outé? Well, after 3 weeks of the World Cup I'm adding this one: I went to the Oprah show and a soccer match broke out.

 

---

Bill:
Heh. Yeah, I can live without the teah baths, the image fakery, the ad hoc officiating, but, I tell ya, I will miss the singing.

 

---

Doug:
And the next time some head up his ass sportswritahstarts to pooh-pooh the anti-Yankees sentiments expressed by Red Sox fans as déclassé or something, I just want to point to international soccer fans.

 

---

Bill:
No kidding, when it comes to crude taunts and just general hatred for another club, we're choir boys and girls by comparison.

 

---

Doug:
Of course, in the eyes of our chattering class, anything the Europeans do, be it smoking, immigration riots, domestic surveillance or whatevah, it's evidence of a sophisticated elan and subtle sang-froid.

 

---

Yo' momma's so...

Mike:
Leave it to David Ortiz to ensure there is no sweep at the hands of the D-Rays.

 

---

Steve:
Papi is more and more like Atlas from Greek Mythology carrying the entire weight of Red Sox Nation on his shoulders.

 

---

Mike:
Absolutely. The guy is a Titan in every sense of the word.

 

---

Steve:
Meanwhile, Dave Pinto continues his obsession with Manny's knee.

 

---

Mike:
C'mon, Dave, if you've got extra time on your hands can't you live blog curling or something instead of going all Magnum P.I.I on the Man Man?

 

---

Steve:
Seriously. I mean nobody cares about the All Star game anyway. It's about as authentic as Paris Hilton's singing career.

 

---

Mike:
Besides, everyone should be happy that Manny at least thought this excuse out big time. I mean he's been working this knee angle for weeks. It's an iron clad alibi.

 

---

Steve:
Frankly, though, I miss the last minute "my grannie's sick" style excuses he's used in the past.

 

---

Mike:
Yeah, it was getting to the point where you half expected him to come up with something like "I can't go to the All Stah Game because the dog ate my plane ticket."

 

---

Steve:
Hey did you see this Edes article on the behind the scenes nastiness at Yawkey way? Who knew Manny had this "you're all a bunch of [expletive] white devils" invective in him.

 

---

Mike:
Really. But, you know, as far as insults go, calling someone a "white devil" is pretty lame.

 

---

Steve:
I'm not even sure it's an insult. I mean some of my best friends are white devils.

 

---

Mike:
Are you kidding me? In high school I was voted most likely to become a white devil.

 

---

Steve:
In any case, why do I get the feeling that if you were playing the dozens with Manny, you could totally flumox him with the 1st grade classic rejoinder "I know you are but what am I?"

 

---

Going all Ghandi

Mike:
I am so not believing this. On the heels of a hellacious win streak, we are now on the verge of getting swept by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays?

 

---

Doug:
OK, that's it then. Time to get big time serious. I'm going on a rolling hungah strike until the Red Sox win again.

 

---

Mike:
Count me in because, you know, nothing demonstrates one's earnestness and passionate protest quite like sacrificing nearly nothing for a cause.

 

---

Doug:
Abso-effin-lutely. And if the rolling hungah strike doesn't wake the Red Sox up, I'll have to up the ante and go totally protest bat shit.

 

---

Mike:
Gonna go all Ghandi on our asses?

 

---

Doug:
You've got that right, guy. Desperate times require desperate actions: I'll have to give up the universal remote and take on the hahdship of changing channels manually at the set box until my demands are met.

 

---

Mike:
Holy fuck. The wear and tear on your knees from getting up and down, up and down off the couch? We're talking potential permanent bodily damage.

 

---

Doug:
Hey, get a grip, guy. It's not about me. It's about the cause.

 

---

Mike:
Well, the good news is we only have one more with the D-Rays and then it's off to Chi Town.

 

---

Doug:
W00T! Can't hardly wait.

 

---

Pretty in Pink

Bill:
OK, so all this talk how the Devil Rays are actually a "really good 'bad' team" is supposed to make me feel bettah or something at dropping anothah?

 

---

Doug:
Yeah, it doesn't give me a high level of confidence in the outcome of the games where the Sox play a really good great team, you know.

 

---

Bill:
Totally. I mean it's the same kind of confidence I get when NASA officials say they have "no concern" over falling foam at liftoff.

 

---

Doug:
Those NASA spokespeople are cut from the same cloth as the always calm managers like Francona: "The foam which can come off has come off." Okey dokey then, move along, people, nothing to see here.

 

---

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the office …

Mike:
I'm not at all surprised to read that Red Sox fans are made up of equal parts men and women.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
And why should you be? I mean your mothah was a Red Sox fan, my mothah was a Red Sox fan, and our mothahs' mothahs were Sox fans …

 

---

Mike:
Yeah, they just didn't wear pink caps and jerseys in those days.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Well, that or they just didn't think to market to women back in the day. You know, I've sort of learned to accept the pink hat crowd.

 

---

Mike:
What?! You of the "loathe the casual fan bitches" pronouncements? Get the fuck out.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Yeah, yeah, I'm lahge and contain multitudes and all that.

 

---

Mike:
So you're telling me that you're not miffed by all the Johnny and Janie come-lately been a fan only since Octobah 2004 types?

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Ah, jeez, we all need to get over this fetish with past. I mean according to the past, no team could evahcome back from an 0-3 deficit in the playoffs and yet … Know what I'm saying?

 

---

Mike:
Yeah but that miraculous comeback from 0 and 3 couldn't really be appreciated by someone who wasn't there for all the other hahtaches, all the other times the Red Sox were jacked by fate.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Look, all I evah heah is how the Red Sox are like a religion. Well, you think if someone walks into St. Marks and says they want to convert that the priest is going to be all, "Well, dude, where the fuck were you when we were getting thrown to the lions?" C'mon.

 

---

Mike:
Yeah, well, I'm still not willing to accept the pink hats. I mean to continue your metaphor, it'd be like if after getting welcomed into the church your dude went up and said, "Yo, Padre, I'm like totally not digging the consistency of that host thingy in my mouth, so when I come forward for communion, I want you to use a LifeSavah instead, M-kay?"

 

---

Mike:
You just can't fuck with the symbols and rituals all willy nilly.

 

---

Susan/Circle:
Good point except that the pink apparel is officially sanctioned by MLB and the Red Sox, so if the Red Sox don't have a problem with it, why should I?

 

---

Mike:
Grrrrrrr …

 

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