Lester, The Twinkies and Other Things--Peter

I may have to agree with you Jenn about Lester. I just had a similar conversation with your uncle, Phillip, this morning about that exact subject. The diff is that he's down on everyone on the mound staff. Upset with Bard & Pap, although I did manage to point out that in Pap's case, he's still getting batters out with only a few exceptions. Bard has always had nuclear stuff, but, until he improves his location and gets some movement on the ball more often, he's still going to get hit at the worst times by the better hitters. If there's no movement or location, any good hitter can time a heater no matter how hot it gets--even triple digits. That's the diff between him & the Laser.Bard tops out just over the century, while Pap "only" gets to 97 or 98. It may not seem like much, but that 2-3 mph is an enormous difference. But Pap gets more out of his "slower" pitches because he gets his to move in more than just a straight line, and he's mastered, usually, the art of locating his pitches. Makes it harder for a hitter to be a hitter--much harder. Ramirez--not much worth saying about him so far. Oki's about where he should be.

On the other side of things, offense, the Hose appear to have a pretty potent lineup doing about what they should be doing, and that, with the still troubling case of Papi, continued today. Dusty nailed his 4th four bagger of the young season and has 10 ribbies now. Youk, newbie Scutaro,Hermida and Beltre (two more Sox newbies) are all making pretty constant good contact. Jake was over .300 when he got hurt the other day, but he appears to be about ready to get back on the field again any day now.

Speaking of today, the W was definitely a team thing. Lackey continued to show why the Sox picked him up, and the pen did a decent job overall of holding the lead, with one brief lapse by Bard. Pap slammed the door, and the Fenmen left the field 6-3victors, back at .500 again. The hitters I mentioned a moment ago did their share, and even Papi got a two-bagger. Speaking of which, who's in the 3d base coaching box? Papi hits a sac fly with a man on 3d and no score. Papi doubles with a runner in scoring position and....you guessed it: no score. Hello, out there! Forget to set the alarm today? Wake up, for Christ's sake!--unless you really believed the guy who should have scored was on crutches or otherwise unable to beat the throw home that a move to the dish would likely have triggered.