Congratulations, Manuel.

vs. Baltimore Orioles 1:35 pm Camden Yards - Baltimore, MD SP: Bartolo Colon vs Brian Burres tv/radio: NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

Dustin Pedroia got the Pop Culture Grid treatment from Sports Illustrated last year (in which we learned that he can't read), and recently it was Clay Buchholz's turn.

Fun fact #1: the guy who is currently bonking a Penthouse Pet loves "Like A Virgin". Of course he does.

Fun fact #2: he has never ridden a mechanical bull. A Texan who has never ridden a mechanical bull? For shame, Clay!

Fun fact #3: he wants to take on teammate Dustin Pedroia in the ring. What kind of ring is not specified... boxing? WWF? jello wrestling? I don't know, Clay- I've seen the damage he can inflict on bats and pinatas. He may be short, but he's scrappy.

This also presents the perfect opportunity to dig into the SI Vault and examine some other Sox'ers who have been Pop Culture Gridded.

Coco Crisp- September 2005
Crappy at golf, but takes out the trash.

David Ortiz - August 2005
Believes in aliens, pays $100 for haircuts.

Tito Francona - July 2005
Drives an SUV, likes Toby Keith, doesn't care about Lindsay Lohan

vs. Baltimore Orioles 7:05 pm Camden Yards - Baltimore, MD SP: Tim Wakefield tv/radio: NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

That high-pitched keening and wailing you hear? Yeah, that's not just Red Sox fans howling in agony after learning this evening that David Ortiz will definitely be out 2 weeks, almost definitely be out a month or more... and may actually need season-ending surgery. Countdown to potential fanbase meltdown at the thought of trying to make a championship run without Big Papi in the lineup starts in 3...2...1...

If you listen closely, you can also hear the folks at MLB and State Farm banging their heads against the wall at the prospect of trying to find a way to pull off their high-profile Call Big Papi's Shot promotion at the All-Star Game... without, you know, Big Papi.

After hyping up the event for weeks, State Farm may not have Big Papi at their disposal after all. Fortunately, they seem to have a fairly sharp legal team, who made sure to add this language to the contest description:

[T]he grand-prize winner will meet David Ortiz* and call their shot at the State Farm Home Run Derby® for a chance to win a Chevy Tahoe hybrid & a 2009 MLB ticket package

*Actual athlete to participate in "Call Your Shot" event to be designated by Sponsor and may not be athlete mentioned

I'm sure if they just substitute in a reasonable equivalent, no one will even notice. I hear Barry Bonds is looking for a gig...

The florists around the Fens are sure to be kept busy over the upcoming weeks, because there are a heckuva lot of Get Well Soon bouquets that need to be sent out.

Get Well Soon: David Ortiz
Someone get out a big honkin' bouquet to Papi's wrist, STAT. Everyone agrees that there is a tear in the tendon sheath in his left wrist (more specifically, a "partial tear of the extensor carpi ulnaris tendon sheath in his left wrist"), and that he'll likely be out for a month... but everyone fears the Boston Herald report that he may need season-ending surgery if that month off doesn't do the trick.

Get Well Soon: Daisuke Matsuzaka
June 12th is circled on the Sox calendar- it's the first day Dice-K is eligible to come off the DL from his "mild deltoid rotator cuff strain". Thank goodness for Bartolo Colon. And who would ever have thought I'd be uttering those words this season.

Get Well Soon Stay Well: Clay Buchholz's Fingernail
I don't know what he did to tear his fingernail so severely as to land on the 15-day DL (overzealous Madonna karaoke? jello wrestling Dustin Pedroia?), but please don't let it happen again while he's in Pawtucket.

Get Well Soon: Hideki Okajima's Mojo
He's allowed 11 of 14 inherited runners to score this season. His ERA just ballooned from 0.72 to 2.10... in one game. He notched his fifth blown save of 2008. With Oki's trademark sensational command going M.I.A., the already rocky (to say the least) bullpen is even more uncertain. Jonathan Papelbon can't be expected to do everything, people!

Get Well Soon: Julio Lugo's Defense
Don't think we've forgotten about you, Mr. Error Man.

File this under: "Things I Wish I'd Never Heard".

"We haven't been able to cash it in very much," catcher Jason Varitek said, "but it puts an extra amount of pressure on the other team, which we haven't been able to do. We've got a lot of big donkeys who clog up the bases."

Jason Varitek... taking a page out of Dusty Baker's book? Say it ain't so! It's like all of a sudden, down is up, left is right, black is white, and Tek has somehow managed to morph into evil incarnate.

Of course, FJM says it even better than me:

Anyone seen that HBO documentary "The Curse of The Bambino"? It's fine, whatever.

After the Scottish Dribbler (you know what I'm talking about), one Bostonian recalls heading out of his house in Newton MA, thinking he'd be going out for a long, solitary walk, only to find hundreds of other Sox-fans-turned-zombies walking the streets. A brokenhearted old man crosses paths and says: "Son, this is the dahkest day in New England since Jack Kennedy was shawt."

That's how I feel about today, after reading this quote.

vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays 7:05 pm Fenway Park - Boston, MA SP: Justin Masterson vs. Matt Garza tv/radio: NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

Baby pitcher Justin Masterson - winning games!
Manny Ramirez - beating out a throw!
JD Drew - blasting a homer!
Bullpen - not sucking!
Coco Crisp - hitting in the clutch!
Julio Lugo - without a single E!
Red Sox - beating the first place Rays!

Please, sir - may I have some more?

I will also take some more of this: Jon Lester receiving recognition before the game for his no-hitter of the Royals. It never gets old, never gets any less awesome.

Fess up. Who peed in Jim Rice's Cheerios?

"I would love to be in the Hall of Fame," Rice said. "But I think today's players would probably say, 'I'm playing for the Hall of Fame.' But I say, 'I played for the Boston Red Sox.' I played for the game. In the back of my mind I wasn't thinking about the Hall of Fame."

Rice also said that the sheer size of the MLB is a problem that weakens the teams within it, adding that just one member of Boston's reigning World Series champions would replace a starter from the team that lost the Series in '75.

"The only one that would've made it, maybe (Jonathan) Papelbon," Rice said. "Because we had Dick Drago out there, Papelbon has a little more velocity than him."

Rice has been particularly unimpressed with current Boston left fielder Manny Ramirez.

"I'm tired of people saying, 'Manny being Manny,'" Rice said. "It's not like I'd take my 11-year old kid to go out and watch 'Manny being Manny,' that's not baseball. (Sunday) he hit home run 501, but, even though he hit 501 they still almost lost the game. Did you see those two plays he made out in left field? Now, do you want your kid to be 'Manny being Manny' missing those balls?"

I picture him saying all this with a bitter lemon-face pucker on his mug the whole time. 'Cause there's bitter, and then there's "Jim Rice getting denied Hall of Fame and taking it out on 'those kids today' (especially the Red Sox, and most especially likely first ballot HOFer Manny Ramirez) even though he gets paid a bunch of money to cover those same Sox" bitter.

Skipping over the irony of Jim essentially accusing ballplayers of being selfish while indulging himself in a mini self-absorbed tirade... I think I'm going to have to disagree with him on principal, too. It's not like the '75 roster was full of slouches - but let's get realistic. Beckett and Dice-K are certain to earn spots in the rotation, most people would take Lowell, Pedroia and Ortiz over their '75 counterparts (Petrocelli, Doyle and Cooper or Carbo), the '07 bullpen was otherworldly - and it would be a close contest between '75 Yaz and '07 Youkilis. What about an injured '75 Pudge Fisk vs. healthy '07 Varitek? And Jim's feud with Manny can best be summed up by BBTF commenter Gonfalon Bubble:

"I'm tired of people saying, 'Manny being Manny,'" Rice said. "It's not like I'd take my 11-year old kid to go out and watch 'Manny being Manny,' that's not baseball.

I wonder if he'll be taking his 22-year-old kid out to upstate New York to watch Manny Being First Ballot?

This kind of attitude is not going to help Jim get into the Hall any faster. Although I do think he definitely has a future in Hollywood playing the role of "Cranky Old Man On A Porch Hollering At Neighborhood Children While Shaking His Cane".

The man can dress like nobody's business, though.

hat tip: BBTF for the article, Surviving Grady for the screencap

Just the other day, I was thinking to myself: "Self, I don't know I've ever seen a photo of Jason Varitek looking like a goofy dweeb. I've seen 'super-serious Jason' and 'slightly less serious, but still totally all-business Jason' and 'ok, fine, I'll give you a small tiny grin Jason'... but I don't know that I've ever seen 'dorky Jason'. Even in pirate gear, he still looks like he'd kick your ass if you looked at him funny."

That is, until now.

I know it's for a good cause and all, but... HAH!

Lest Jason think I'm picking on him too much lately, how about video of the super-cute commercial with Jon Lester for his Putt-Putt Tournament? (yes, I just called it "super-cute")

vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays 7:05 pm Fenway Park - Boston, MA SP: Josh Beckett vs. Edwin Jackson tv/radio: ESPN - NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

Everybody has already seen the ubiquitous youtube video of the Sox fan in a Celtics jersey who ran on the field during the game Tuesday night. The posted video claimed it was on a dare from "a bunch of Lakers fans"... but intrepid Center Field reader Meghan has the real story.

The guy who ran out was in a Celtics jersey, but his friends that he was with were decked out in Laker stuff (spontaneous "Beat LA!" chants kept starting in our section because of them). One of the Laker guys had a purple and yellow wig...so sometime in the eighth a few of them started to walk down toward the wall in RF. The guy in the C's jersey had put the Laker wig on for some reason. Right after Hansen got to the mound, C's guy jumped onto the field and ran out towards LF, quickly followed by two security guards. The wig fell off right after he started running.

By the time he got to CF-area, a third security guy had jumped out from LF, so he had three guys chasing him. They attempted to catch him several times, with one of the security guys face-planting after an unsuccessful tackle attempt. The dude eventually ran up to the low LF wall and jumped right over back into the stands, and another security guard made a very Jeterian nose-dive into the stands right behind him.

And the kid was fast! Easily outran all the security guys, which made it even more funny.

Meghan suggested that if someone is able to streak completely all the way across the field and into the stands on the other side, they should be allowed to stay inside the field as a reward for having the skill (and balls) to avoid security. Unfortunately, I'm betting from the handcuffs (see below), he ended up in a holding cell somewhere.

Center Field reader Adam also sent some kickass eyewitness photos of the chase, which take us from this:

To this:

See all the photos after the jump...

Continue reading »

MLB's First-Year Player Draft starts today at 2pm, and finishes up tomorrow. Even if the process isn't all flash and craziness like the NFL Draft (or even the NBA Draft), the results of the draft are always interesting to pick through.

Courtesy of the club's World Championship, the Sox will pick 30th out of 30 in the first round. Courtesy of Eric Gagne, the Sox will then get a sandwich round pick (#45 overall). The Sox also pick at #77 (second round), #85 (third round), #108 (third round), and then last in each of rounds 4-50. Yes, FIFTY.

The Rays have already announced they will take Tim Beckham, a high school shortstop out of Georgia, with their #1 overall pick. Most commentators project that when the draft reaches Boston at #30, they'll select Lance Lynn (right-handed pitcher) from the University of Mississippi. Which would make for some epic rivalry contests with Mississippi State alum Jonathan Papelbon.

The most productive draft for the Red Sox in recent history was, of course, the 2005 draft- which yielded Jacoby Ellsbury, Craig Hansen, Clay Buchholz, Jed Lowrie and Michael Bowden. The Red Sox director of Amateur Scouting spoke with NESN earlier this week about how things went down that year- and the inner workings of that draft are interesting to look back on.

video courtesy of NESN

If anyone wants to discuss the draft as it goes on today and tomorrow, you can feel free to use this as a kind of open thread.

vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays 6:05 pm Fenway Park - Boston, MA SP: Jon Lester vs. James Shields tv/radio: NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

The Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays showed up for a brawl, and somehow a baseball game managed to break out. The official tally of carnage by the end of the dustup: 3 ejections (Coco Crisp, James Shields, Jonny Gomes), 1 missed haymaker, 1 cuff to the back of the head, and 50 sucker punches/girly hair pulls and face scratches. Elijah Dukes is so pissed he got traded away and missed all the action.

Here's a breakdown of all the brouhaha - with video clips of everything for those of you who missed it.

Step One: The History

This wasn't the first time the Sox and Rays have gotten into it. There's bad blood between the two clubs, and a simmering feud that dates back for almost a decade.

video courtesy of NESN

Step Two: The Buildup

Last night, Coco Crisp got into a shouting match with Rays manager Joe Maddon over Coco's hard slide into Rays second baseman Akinori Iwamura. But as Coco saw it, it was payback for earlier in the game when Rays shortstop Jason Bartlett placed his leg down to block second base as Coco slid headfirst into the bag.

"He put his whole knee in front of the bag, and it's not something you do as an infielder. You can do that, but that's shady," Crisp said. "And he's not a bad dude, but that's shady. It is what it is. You gonna hurt me, I'm going to come back and hurt you."

"If I would have intended to injure I wouldn't have slid at all. I would have just ran him over like he was a catcher," Crisp said. "I went in hard to send a message. If I wanted to injure him, I would have jump-kicked his (butt). But I didn't do that.

"He put his knee down and injured me a little bit . . . if I really wanted to injure him, I could have. If Bartlett would have covered, might have been a little more dramatic."

video courtesy of NESN

Continue reading »

Coco Crisp wasn't the only Sox getting into a dustup last night. Manny Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis got into a fracas of their own... with each other.

During the break between the fourth and fifth innings, Manny and Youk exchanged words in the dugout-- about which no one knows (and Tito wasn't forthcoming in the post-game press conference). Whatever was said, it was enough to cause the normally placid Manny to go off on Kevin - delivering a slap to his head, and then a shove into the water cooler.

Alex Cora, Sean Casey and Josh Beckett (among others) quickly jumped in between the pair. Manny was carted off down to the clubhouse by a couple of guys (presumably to shove him under a cold shower to cool his jets) -- and Youk was left to wander bewildered on the field, asking Sean Casey what the hell just happened.

Here's video of the incident, caught on camera by NESN.

video courtesy of NESN

Let's take a quick tally of the wild and wacky happenings last night at Fenway, shall we?

1st inning: Gametime begins early at 6:05, moved to accommodate Celtics game.
1st inning: Manny Ramirez launches homer #503, a three-run shot.
2nd inning: James Shields drills Coco Crisp; Coco charges the mound; basebrawl ensues.
2nd inning: In the aftermath, Coco, Shields and Jonny Gomes are all ejected.
2nd inning: Chris Carter makes his major league debut, replacing the ejected Coco.
4th inning: Jacoby Ellsbury makes spectacular diving catch, bends wrist backwards in a way God doesn't intend, leaves the game.
4th inning: Kevin Youkilis called in to play outfield.
5th inning: Manny and Youk get into a mini-brawl with each other in the dugout.
7th inning: Manny tweaks his hamstring while at-bat, leaves the game.
7th inning: Kevin Cash called in from the bullpen to pinch run for Manny.
9th inning: Red Sox complete sweep of Rays, go up 1.5 games in AL East.

Was it something in the water? Because that's a serious run of crazy stuff. Wait- there's something else to add to the list:

Pregame: Stephen King makes appearance, does interview on NESN in Sox ballcap.

This was no coincidence, people. It all makes sense now. That guy is the very definition of weird- it's no wonder Fenway was a strange place last night.

video courtesy of NESN

Coco Crisp will be suspended for his actions in last night's brawl - that's no surprise. But what is surprising is that Jon Lester also earned himself a suspension... as did Nicest Guy On Earth Sean Casey. Although the reasons are not published, it's fairly easy to guess why Coco, Lester and Casey will be riding the pine.

Coco- 7 game suspension, scheduled to begin tonight
Charging the mound, obviously.
*appealed the suspension, will play tonight

Lester - 5 game suspension, to begin tonight
After both benches were warned, hit both Carl Crawford and Akinori Iwamura with a pitch (plus threw behind Willie Aybar).
*accepted the suspension, will miss his next start

Casey - 3 game suspension, to begin June 14th
All I saw was Casey pulling people off of the dogpile on top of James Shields - but apparently MLB thought he was in there throwing punches.
*has not decided whether to accept or appeal the suspension

Four Rays were also handed suspensions: James Shields (6 games), Jonny Gomes (5 games), Edwin Jackson (4 games), Carl Crawford (4 games), and Akinori Iwamura (3 games). The list makes sense, but I'd have given Gomes and Crawford at LEAST 7- preferably 10 games for repeatedly punching a guy in the head who was being held down, 5 to Shields, and 3 to Jackson (like Casey).

Obviously, all of these suspensions- and the timing of their enforcement- is subject to any appeals the players file.

And in other Fight Night news, sources confirmed to both the Globe and ESPN that the cause of the dustup between Manny Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis was Youk's tendency to pitch a fit in the dugout after a poor at-bat. Per the Globe:

According to three sources, Manny had raised objections to Youkilis throwing equipment around in the dugout after flying deep to center in the fourth inning, and advised him to "cut that (shit) out." Youkilis apparently didn't take kindly to the remark, said something, and Manny swiped at him.

And per ESPN Deportes:

A Red Sox source told ESPNdeportes.com's Enrique Rojas that the cause of the dugout disagreement was Youkilis' temper following a poor at-bat.

"It all happened because Manny complained about Youkilis' habit of throwing bats, helmets and other objects in the dugout when he has a bad at-bat, something that has become a constant practice," the source said.

"Other players have told Youkilis in the past about the situation, which makes him look selfish and that he is more worried about each at-bat than about the team. If Boston is winning easily, there's no reason to throw objects all over the dugout because of a bad at-bat.

"There was a meeting where the team let Youkilis know that many of his teammates were tired of his explosive reactions for each bad plate appearance. It became very bothersome ... more so when the team is winning and it's in first place. There's not much room for individualistic attitudes."

vs. Seattle Mariners 7:05 pm Fenway Park - Boston, MA SP: Bartolo Colon tv/radio: NESN - MLB.TV - WRKO

vs. Seattle Mariners 3:55 pm Fenway Park - Boston, MA SP: Tim Wakefield tv/radio: FOX - MLB.TV - WRKO