"That's the Good News?"

by Ron Sen, MD

You wake up sweating, and not because the humidity has reached Panamanian proportions. The superstitions invoked have failed, such as not wearing team paraphernalia or avoiding watching the games in HD because of bad karma. Your food taste bad, but you're still trapped by stress eating. Really, you need professional help. Stop watching the Red Sox.

Last night, even an hour and fifty-six minute rain delay couldn't save the Sox from themselves.

Last year Tony Massarotti bemoaned the lack of seats in "America's Most Beloved Ballpark", as though nouveau fans abrogated long-timers 'rights'. Now the latecomers have the same access to headaches, spastic colon, and mood swings as their forbearers.

And what exactly do Red Sox fans root for? The Fenway ten (DH league) have simply become Yankees Light, with the same astronomical payroll, which allows the spend without end philosophy, places player development on a lower tier, and creates fandom with 'entitlement'.

Evidence-based baseball? Well, the pitching has improved, thanks to the imports (Beckett, Matsuzaka, Schilling (when healthy), and Okajima. But the bats remind more of the struggling Pedro Cerrano than Murderer's Row. On a good day lately, the best the Sox can hope for is some manufactured runs from Lugo and Crisp, as the core of the lineup hasn't delivered.

In a society where recriminations and blame mean everything, where does one begin? It's hard to blame John Henry who hasn't tightened the purse strings. Player development seems to have improved (Pedroia, Delcarmen), with a host of prospects on the fringe of advancement (Lester, Ellsbury, Buchholz, Moss, Murphy) and some talents (Bowden, Lowrie, Masterson) showing promise at intermediate levels. Where fans want to point fingers are trades and free agent acquisitions that have brought Drew, Crisp, and Lugo, and Pena, who haven't panned out.

While Sox haters understandably shout with glee, locals only assuage their disappointment with merchandising distractions - picnics at Fenway, Red Sox Nation contests, Reality Dating shows, and miscellaneous sideshows that Real Baseball fans roll their eyes at.

At least they're not the Bruins or the Celtics, for whom we have already exhausted our supply of tar and feathers. That's the Good News.