Baby New Year

Bill:
So among the backlog of vacation emails and voicemails I've been trudging through this morning, there's one from our ol' nemesis Mahty.

 

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Doug:
Let me guess — Yankees are hot stove winnerz and in all their January greatness they'll finally cast the Red Sux into oblivion this season.

 

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Bill:
Heh. Yeah, that and Theo is an idiot, of course, for standing pat.

 

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Doug:
Ah, poor Mahty and his Yanks both fail to learn the lesson of 2008 -- We've entered the era of the young, steroid-free playah.

 

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Bill:
Well those are certainly two topics about which the Yankees know little.

 

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Doug:
And, of course, the othah lesson of 08 was the importance of great defense.

 

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Bill:
Absolutely. That Tampa Bay went from worst defense in the league and last place on 07, to one of the two best in the AL and a trip to the World Series is telling.

 

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Doug:
Unless you're the Yankees who continue to pahty like it's 1999 with all bat and and a 9 guys who move like tired cattle.

 

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Bill:
Oh, you know, I'm sure those old guys in pinstripes with wicket legs and ahms like girls will be fine. It's not like the decline in average age between 2007 and 2008 was the largest in major league history and that 24 of the 30 teams got younger between 2007 and 2008 or anything.

 

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Bill:
And let's not forget that lahge payroll sometimes does translate into winning. Not very often but it does happen.

 

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Doug:
Yeah, from what I've read, only twice in the past 30 years has a team won the World Series with a $100 million payroll.

 

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Bill:
Gee, I wondah what team that was?

 

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Doug:
Welcome to the Red Sox Century, bitches.

 

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Comments

[Bob]

In best Peggy Hill voice: "oh yeah!"

[buckner was framed]

So Pat Burrell takes a $6M pay cut to sign with the Rays and says "I feel very fortunate to have accepted a deal. I don't think this is the offseason a lot of people expected"

How cool would it be if Manny had to "settle" for $15-18 per? Heh, I'm getting wood just thinking about it

[louclinton]

"The game is played between the lines"

lc

[sonomasox]

Gammo isn't a NAMBLA member, is he?

[Jeff in NC]

So last night I sat in a pizza joint with my sons (wearing redsox t shirts) and had to endure our Yankee loving waitress trying to ridicule my 9 and 10 yr old's favorite team. It was all good natured.. She, with her "Glad I won't have to wait 80 yrs for another championship" BS, and I, with my "we can always go and buy one like the yankees do" BS, had a fine little tet-a-tet.

Then she brought me my beer like a good girl.

She had no retort for my query.. "When exactly did Mark Texiera become Micky Mantle?" The baseball world, and specifically the yankees in their desperation, were chasing this guy like he is the greatest player in the history of the game! He's good, but I kind of agree with the boys in the strip on the yanks landing him - Meh.

[Jeff in NC]

another thought just crept out of the gray matter... on the youth movment - Hell yes its the right way to go! Compare Pedrioa flopping around the infield catching everything his side of Framingham to Jeter hobbling around his side of the diamond mssing anything below his knees and more than 10' to either side. Captain, shmaptain. I like the Sox this year - Pedey, Youks, Ellsbury tempered by the experience of the likes of Lowell and Drew

[Bob]

From the Globe (after John Tesh-iera's press conference:

//Mark Teixeira today said he had his sights set on the Bronx two weeks before Christmas.//

That means he strung the Red Sox along like Christmas lights.

[h.b]

I know that the trolls will just brand this as "sour grapes," but, like many of you, I honestly never felt much enthusiasm for Teixeira.

Yeah, if we signed him I'd have been happy and rooted for him just as I root for JD Drew.

But as with JD Drew, I never really understood Theo's infatuation with the guy, just like I didn't understand the infatuation with Teixeira.

I guess part of my malaise with players like Drew and Teixeira is that they aren't those sort of larger than life figures I can mythologize ala a Manny or a Papi or to include other teams, a Vlad the Impaler or a Pujols.

[cgpunker]

Um, when can I get my "Welcome to the Red Sox Century, bitches" coffee mug?