A few things about tonight's shitty 7-1 loss in Oakland:

1. The Aceves thing. Say what you will about whether or not he should have just gotten out of Salty's way, but don't tell me he "shoved" or "barreled through" Salty. That's what that lunkheaded Pete Abe and the NESN Daily guy said about it. There was barely any contact at all, and it came when Aceves raised his arms in an attempt to catch the ball as he was calling for it. I made a video for you:

Thing to remember about Aceves: The guy seems to take a lot of pride in his fielding. Go to a game early and you'll see him taking pepper drills with Gary Tuck. How many times have we heard announcers say "why don't pitchers just learn how to catch pop-ups?" Guy thought he had the best chance at a ball he knew he could catch so he went for it. And dropped it. In an inning where he also had "words" with Pedroia in the dugout. So it all looked really bad. But I think when you take a step back you see this wasn't any kind of travesty. I also like how Aceves stood up to Abe himself in post-game. Abe asked him about the miscommunication on the field and Aceves started berating him by saying "that's what you say, you're not asking, you're telling" and patronizingly calling him "buddy." Man, I hope that pantload was shitting his pants. I love how we're hearing more and more from the players how shitty this media is, along with more ignoring or "none of your business" answers. I feel kind of vindicated for having the anti-media weekend. Anyway, the thing I didn't like was Aceves shooing his manager away for doing nothing more than trying to pat him on the ass.

2. The Salty bunt. When the A's fans were booing him his next time up after bunting to end a perfect game bid in the fifth inning, my mind went right to: I didn't hear them booing their own team the night before when they were tacking on runs 19 and 20 in the 8th inning. Yet a bunt in a no-hitter that hadn't even reached 5 innings and they're appalled? Gimme a break. Remy agreed with my theory, and got PISSED when Don took the other side. They were bickering like an old married couple, but you could tell Jerry was actually mad. If you're gonna follow the unwritten code for one thing, you have to follow it for all the things.

3. Don getting ahead of himself. I've mentioned before how Don will often jump the gun on a play, occasionally screwing himself when what he assumes will happen doesn't. But tonight he took it to the next level. He was so sure Podsednik was going to jump at the wall for a home run ball, he actually called it as "Podsednik leaps..." and didn't correct himself when the guy stayed on the ground. The whole thing was made funnier by the fact that the wall is, what, 12-15 feet high at that point? Check out the video I "hosted" about the play: