Tag: Red Sox

The Sox are playing? Uh, not really.

How did I not know the Red Sox were playing tonight? I thought it was tomorrow. Anyway, I haven’t watched one moment of this game, and it’s just as well, seeing they’re down 11-1 after six.

I will not count these guys out until they lose four games. But the fact is that this is the thinnest team the Sox have field in quite some time, mainly because of injuries. If you’ve only got three guys hitting, Beckett isn’t Beckett and Lester isn’t Lester, well, the results aren’t going to be good.

Besides, the Rays are a better team than the Sox, or better, at least, than the Sox without Mike Lowell, a healthy David Ortiz, a healthy J.D. Drew … you get the picture. And unlike the Angels, the Rays are tough as nails.

A nasty, brutish and short postseason? (II)

The Red Sox confirm that Josh Beckett has a strained oblique, and announce that he’s been pushed back to Game 3. That sounds pretty mild for an oblique injury, although the team concedes it could take Beckett longer than that.

On second thought, though, I like Lester and Matsuzaka in the first two games, as long as the bullpen’s ready to take over in the sixth for Daisuke’s start. By all rights, the Angels should win this — which means, as Bob Ryan notes, that there’s not as much pressure on the Sox.

A nasty, brutish and short postseason?

I didn’t like the Red Sox’ chances even before the latest news — just too many key guys hurt. I’m amazed they made the playoffs with such ease, given that it seemed like they never really got hot all season. (Although they’ve had a terrific won-loss record since The Trade.)

Now Steve Buckley of the Boston Herald reports that Josh Beckett might be out with an oblique injury. I don’t want to say stick a fork in them. But you might as well keep one handy. (Via Universal Hub.)

The Red Sox’ first Latino superstar

In today’s Boston Globe, Keith O’Brien writes about the diminishing number of Latino players on the Red Sox — and compares the current team to the all- or mostly white teams of the past.

Point taken. But O’Brien steps in it when he refers to a “team whose stars typically looked like Ted Williams or Carl Yastrzemski” in describing those mostly white line-ups. The problem here is that Williams, as many knowledgeable fans know, was only the greatest Latino star in baseball history.

Williams’ mother, Micaela “May” Venzor, was the daughter of parents who were born in Mexico, Pablo Venzor and Natalia Hernández. In his 1969 autobiography, “My Turn at Bat,” Williams, who himself was born and grew up in San Diego, writes of his mother:

Her maiden name was Venzor, and she was part Mexican and part French, and that’s fate for you; if I had had my mother’s name, there is no doubt I would have run into problems in those days, the prejudices people had in Southern California.

May Venzor Williams was a volunteer for the Salvation Army, an avocation that kept her away from home most of the time, and about which her son complains bitterly in “My Turn at Bat.”

O’Brien’s mistake is not unusual. In 2005, the New York Times groused that Williams had been left off Major League Baseball’s list of “Latino Legends.” Williams’ Latino background is not well-known. But that makes it no less real.

Tony Mazz jumps to the Globe

Two developments coming out of the Boston Globe sports department, courtesy of Adam Reilly.

In the non-surprise department, Amalie Benjamin succeeds Gordon Edes, now with Yahoo Sports, as the Globe’s Red Sox beat reporter. Interesting and good that the Globe would put a woman in that high-profile slot. Even better, it represents a long-overdue generational shift. If this Wikipedia bio is accurate, Benjamin is 26 years old.

In the big-surprise department, the Boston Herald’s Tony Massarotti is leaving One Herald Square to join a beefed-up Boston.com sports operation. Massarotti is a leading reason to read the Herald, so this is a huge, huge loss. It also tells me that Globe sports editor Joe Sullivan is at least as concerned about competing with the newly ascendant WEEI.com as he is with the Herald. (Sullivan is also promoting part-time copy editor Chad Finn to a new job as a sports reporter for Boston.com.)

Unless the Globe loosens its WEEI ban [see tweak below] , it also means one of the station’s most recognizable voices will no longer be heard. Of course, now Massarotti can appear on New England Sports Network, a corporate cousin to the Globe.

The best news about all of this is that job creation continues at 135 Morrissey Boulevard, shifting from the print edition to the Web site.

Friday tweak: According to the Joan Vennochi column I linked to last night, as well as to a piece I wrote in April 2001, I glossed over the ban just a bit too glibly. Former Globe editor Matt Storin banned his people from appearing on “The Big Show,” in the afternoon, and later extended it to “Dennis & Callahan” as well. WEEI retaliated by announcing that Globe writers had been banned from all of its programs. So it’s kind of a mutual ban.