So Much for Invincibility

Well, that's what WMYM gets for predicting the first undefeated baseball season in modern history.

After building a 2-0 lead in the annual series of Red Sox-Twins matchups that comprise the Mayor's Cup, Boston was thoroughly trounced Sunday in a game that highlighted a number of potential issues. Still, none of those issues are more acute than the race for the team's fourth and fifth starter's spots, which are open, alive and well following the second straight atrocious appearance by a projected starter, this one a four-run, two-inning outing from rookie Clay Buchholz - offering up an apparently unimpressive two-seamer in an AP shot below - after Jon Lester couldn't GET through two frames a day earlier.


No matter how you slice it, Buchholz's performance, which followed two more impressive innings from Tim Old Man Winter Wakefield, gave us the ugliest pitching line of Boston's spring so far: 2.0 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 1 BB, 1 K for your grand total of ... wait for it ... an 18.00 ERA. Yes, 18. Buchholz was thoroughly outdueled by the likes of career independent league journeyman Pat Neshek and Matt Guerrier. If you even KNOW who either one of those guys is, you probably spend too much time on Baseball Reference or, at the very least, Baseball Prospectus (guilty as charged).

What does that mean for the Sox's future? Well, surely it means that Bartolo Colon better get that long tossing ramped up just a bit more. It also means that somewhere, Freddy Garcia's agents are almost surely smiling broadly. When Garcia met with Sox reps and doctors last week, it was assumed that the conference was about a potential future signing, targeted for a month or two into the season. Garcia won't be ready to go until then, but it's possible that if Lester, Buchholz, Tavarez et. al continue to struggle at current rates, Epstein-Lucchino LLC might splash a touch of cash to lock him up before he gets more expensive. Or before another major or mid-major market team (Phillies, cough cough, Cubs, cough) jumps the shark to lock him up Colon-style.

And what about the bats? Where did they go against Livan Hernandez? Yes, THAT Livan Hernandez. The guy who looked like a world beater for Florida, and has pretty much been "mehhh" for his career since. Well, of the notables, Big Papi, Pedroia, Lowell and Lugo all notched hits, while none of the players who HAD  been burning up the basepaths early - Coco Crisp, George Kottaras and Jonathan Van Every (WHO!?!?! Oh, nevermind. The dude's Spring Training number is 78) could solve El Livan's gut, Neshek's surprising intellectualism or, well, anything else the Twins threw at them.

Oh well, it's still a Sunday, right? Time to go grab a Sam and watch the sunset. Gotta love Spring Training, when you can lose and not care a bit. Gotta love it.


Cameron covers the Red Sox on his blog, Who Made You Mirabelli?
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