The Sox are set to music, now more than ever at Fenway Park. In addition to the plate-arrival tunes for each batter, songs for certain pitchers, and certain game situations; there is piped-in music to segue between innings and other moments of the game where there is apparently not enough ambient noise. All part of the entertainment product! Fans become more subdued though, with so much to take in and listen too-cheering and heckling have become a bit of an afterthought. Booooooo!
The dirty little secret regarding all those empty Yankee Stadium luxury seats, is that they are actually paid for, by big business and individual fat cats, but, no one in a recession wants to be caught dead sitting in them! Only in New York!! Yes, it’s just-not-smart corporate career climbing, backstabbing, etc. to be sitting in the Bob Uecker seats while the non-Tarp riff raff sit above you just a battery-throw away.
The conspicuous new General Motors tagline “Reinventing the Ownership Experience”, could be used to sum up the times we live in-at all levels-country, economy, and yes even Red Sox Nation. On Opening Day, Red Sox players were asked to walk in through the crowds at Fenway. Up close, owner-fans can be scary for players; staring them down, pointing cameras and cell phones at them, grabbing, slapping, screaming, “Sign this for my brother!”, “I love you!”, “Over here!!” but such is the reinvention in a recession. Well, someone has to pay for all those Million dollar salaries. Yes, and maybe GM should start putting baseball players in cars.
The Red Sox start the 2009 season not as favorites, or even as the second best team in the AL East-despite friendly press reports to the contrary-and in this economy they can’t afford a losing April. Starters Mike Lowell, Jason Varitek, JD Drew and Big Papi may all be too old to hit. With a surplus of pitching it’s a wonder why Theo Epstein hasn’t traded Clay Bucholtz for 23 year-old hitting phenom and catcher Jerrod Saltalamacchia. The dispassionate GM could be remaking the club in his dispassionate image, at least that’s what some ex-Red Sox free spirits, discarded from the 2004 & 2007 Championship teams would have you believe. Manny is still making Red Sox Nation look bad. Are we uptight and overly-obsessed with baseball? Patriarchal and controlling? Provincial? Obsessed with the Yankees? Well, Manny seems to be having a lot of fun, and the Sox seem to be missing something. Boston is not hitting well this Spring, couldn’t score in Game 7 of last year, and if Manny keeps hitting AND laughing Theo may wonder if the two were meant to go hand and hand together. The free spirits of ‘04 & ‘07 are long gone. It may soon be no laughing matter.
Familiarity does not breed contract... There is barely a peep regarding a long term contract for Jonathan Papelbon. Too bad. He is more than a good player. He is a great player. A pressure performer and stud pitcher, and Papelbon is fun-which counts for something, especially to the paying fans at Fenway where he is lustily cheered and has deservedly become a 9th inning institution for the Red Sox. But familiarity breeds contempt, among some fans and management. The team blithely signs unknown quantity John Lackey to a $70M deal it could have given to known quantity Papelbon. Josh Beckett gets handed an even better deal and is arguably only the third best pitcher on the staff behind Lester and Bucholtz. Other older players such as Big Papi and JD Drew may be coming off the books soon, and that money should go to retain one of the most popular, clutch and great pitchers of recent Red Sox history.
Careful Mr. Henry, or he’ll put on the pinstripes and take Mariano’s place!
(0)
Listen to the Ghost of Johnny Most discuss the Celt's 2008 Season
