Monday, May 12, 2008
Gus Baker
It amazes me how reactionary people can be when it comes to their defending champion, first place team. People are calling sports shows talking about how Lugo is a liability, and how we should just replace him with Lowrie and then and only then will everything be okay.
Lugo frustrates me. Largetime. I believe my quote from last season involved "leaving him at the hotel when the team flies to the next city." But come on, people, if he has a great couple of days and starts to settle in to his '08 season, nobody will say shit anymore.
I think this thinking comes from the fact that people look for the negative amongst all the positives. Every team wants to be perfect, but A. that can't happen and B. you don't need to be perfect to win the World Series. You don't need an All-Star at every position. You don't look at a team with eight All-Stars that's won the last five World Series and complain about the ninth player.
I look at our team like this: We've got great starting pitching. We've got a great closer. We've got a great line-up. Yes, there are issues with this team but we're built to win as we are. I'm all for arguments about how to make the team better and I know Theo & Co are always trying to do just that. But I don't think we should just look at a few weeks and judge everything based on that. If we did that, David Ortiz would've been let go in April, and Dustin Pedroia would be a star in some other city.
I also wonder about the whole "championships causing complacency" theory. For me, that's not it all. Because in 2004, all season, I just sat back knowing that our team was good enough to win, and that the Yanks could be beat. In other words, I was complacent to a degree without ever having seen my team win a World Series. It's more like confidence, I think. Only now is it truly justified, but I still had it in '04. The minute after Aaron Boone hit that home run, I knew we were winning the next year.
So, of course, get mad and talk about the on-field execution of players who cost us games at the time. It's fun and it's part of being a fan. But I hope, with this team and what it has done lately, and where it is now, people can at least calm down by the next morning.
[bottom note: Abe Alvarez was released from the PawSox. Too bad that career never took off. I was at Fenway for that first start of his in '04....]
Lugo frustrates me. Largetime. I believe my quote from last season involved "leaving him at the hotel when the team flies to the next city." But come on, people, if he has a great couple of days and starts to settle in to his '08 season, nobody will say shit anymore.
I think this thinking comes from the fact that people look for the negative amongst all the positives. Every team wants to be perfect, but A. that can't happen and B. you don't need to be perfect to win the World Series. You don't need an All-Star at every position. You don't look at a team with eight All-Stars that's won the last five World Series and complain about the ninth player.
I look at our team like this: We've got great starting pitching. We've got a great closer. We've got a great line-up. Yes, there are issues with this team but we're built to win as we are. I'm all for arguments about how to make the team better and I know Theo & Co are always trying to do just that. But I don't think we should just look at a few weeks and judge everything based on that. If we did that, David Ortiz would've been let go in April, and Dustin Pedroia would be a star in some other city.
I also wonder about the whole "championships causing complacency" theory. For me, that's not it all. Because in 2004, all season, I just sat back knowing that our team was good enough to win, and that the Yanks could be beat. In other words, I was complacent to a degree without ever having seen my team win a World Series. It's more like confidence, I think. Only now is it truly justified, but I still had it in '04. The minute after Aaron Boone hit that home run, I knew we were winning the next year.
So, of course, get mad and talk about the on-field execution of players who cost us games at the time. It's fun and it's part of being a fan. But I hope, with this team and what it has done lately, and where it is now, people can at least calm down by the next morning.
[bottom note: Abe Alvarez was released from the PawSox. Too bad that career never took off. I was at Fenway for that first start of his in '04....]
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