Just for you: Clarity from Red Sox Nation, where ever that may be

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Here is word from Michael Schur, the voice behind Ken Tremendous of Partridge, KS.  It is clear.  It is sound. It's what we have come to expect, and it makes me feel small.

The Collapse of the Red Sox: The Bad Old Days are Here Again

Here's the opening greatness.  After going through a few questions as to what this whole scene looks like if the Red Sox win just two more games, he arrives at --

We know the answer, actually. Bob Hohler's Boston Globe article probably isn't written, or if it is, it's one-fifth as long and entirely ignored, because: Who cares? 

Damn fucking straight, who cares.  I'll tell you who fucking care, the Ghostfaces who want their ghosts back.  Fuck WAR and VORP, y'all. GHOSTS!  That's the shit that kept us from winning.

Sigh.

Here is some evidence that the bad old days are here again.  People in and around Boston are calling for the trade of Jon Lester.

Jon. Lester.  Let's forget, for the moment, that trading this guy runs counter to the popular narrative  (he beat cancer, he's a hero vs. trade him, he likes video games. You can't have it both ways, folks).

Jon Lester is signed through 2013 at 5 years $30M, with a 2014 club option.  The next 3yrs years look like this:

12:$7.625M, 13:$11.625M, 14:$13M club option 

Cliff Lee is signed at 5/$120M, his next 3 yrs:


 12:$21.5M, 13:$25M, 14:$25M

You can wander over fangraphs and see that Lee has been worth about a win or two more a year since 2008, and that is no small thing.  But he is also 6 years older than Jon Lester.

My point? Stop being assholes!

how do you make money?

Mike Lupica is famous.  The NY Daily News pays him money to write about Yankees baseball.

He turns things like this out --

So Cashman, who has given Yankee fans Sabathia in the last 10 years and a lot of guys named Burnett and Kevin Brown and Randy Johnson and Javy (Grand Slam) Vazquez and Jaret Wright - guys who make you stand and cheer when they're NOT giving up five runs a game - talked about re-arming the Yankees, you bet. What he really meant that night when he talked about pitching was Cliff Lee, whom he was supposed to money-whip into coming to New York.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/yankees/2011/08/28/2011-08-28_yankees_fans_have_gm_brian_cashman_to_blame_for_giving_them_aj_burnett_and_his_s.html#ixzz1WR3mjCcK

 1. Cashman has given Yankee fans a lot of guys named ...

Um.  By my math he has only given Yankee fans one each of these guys, respectively.

2. Guys who make you cheer when they're NOT giving up five runs a game.

Once again. UM! Who the fuck cheers WHEN anyone is giving up five runs a game?

3.  The Yankee pitching staff is amazingly awesome.  It's strange, but very true.  They have given up only 525 runs.  They play the Red Sox, who have scored the second most runs in baseball this season, 19 times.  This is the 5th best clip in the league.  Also keep in mind that they score an insane amount of runs; the best in the league, in fact.

Sigh.  This is entirely too common.  That some dip-shit can rant and rail that something is so, when it is is actually very different.

I just wish we stopped paying them money and attention. NotGraphs does an amazing job at reducing foolish writing into glib sentences.  You should read them and make THEM famous and pay THEM money.

We Win

These were my thoughts, from England, when the Red Sox won the World Series in 2004.

What a scene it was. A girl from France, a friend from Italy, and a man from Libya standing in my room, watching me dowse myself with champagne, and cry. Cry like a little girl with a skinned knee. Only, like, a good skinned knee.

No, these aren't exactly the folks who were in all those dreams I have had about this moment. But God knows most of you were.

Here, on my tiny Dell laptop, I have remained connected to this Nation for the last two months, nay, the summer. But here [in England] there is No Riv, no NESN, no Niels or Ted. No drunk phone calls to my sister, or Jason or Villa. Only me, and the occasional inquisitive European.

At the Sports Cafe, Haymarket Square's Riviera Cafe, during the announcement of the starting line-ups in game one, (just one of many moments where I was seen holding a beer and weeping) a man actually walked up to me and said, "I am from Greece, and I have never seen a baseball game before, can you explain the game to me?" Like form start to finish? Explain baseball?

Looking back at that question I think of this - Tony LaRussa was just swept out of the World Series by THE RED SOX!!! Wait, Tony LaRussa the Manager of one the greatest Cardinals Regular Season Teams ever, which puts them in the running for one of the greatest teams ever, just got swept out of the World Series by the Red Sox.

Oh and to get to this point, all the Red Sox had to do was come from behind, with less than six outs, with Mariano Rivera on the mound, twice. Then win two more. In the Bronx.
I'm sorry brother, but no one can explain baseball.

Can anyone explain why I am weeping so heavily or why I have slept an aggregate 60 hours in the last two and half weeks?

Can anyone explain how Derek Lowe, who managed to pitch just above .500 ball this year, four hit the Cardinals?

Can anyone explain how Pedro Martinez three hit the same Cardinals the night before? This man, who, in 2004 gave up more homers than in 1999, 2000, and 2001, combined!

Certainly not. This was, as I have said many times, The Year. That's the only way to explain it.

This day, actually, marks the fourth year that Katie McGlynn and I have known each other. After four years, Kathleen has now seen me cry more in the last few weeks than she ever thought she'd see a 'grown' man cry. From now on, if we disagree on a restaurant, or a movie, or directions, she can kindly retort, "What are you gonna do, cry about it? Fucking Sissy".

Everyone wants to talk about the lunar eclipse, but really, we should be talking about how Katie McGlynn tried to pick me up after a friend of mine suddenly passed away. It was four years ago that she asked, "Are you sure you should be alone tonight?"

But thanks to our passion for the Red Sox, yours and mine, and the internet, I am not alone tonight.

I am not alone in these thoughts.

I am thinking of my grandfather, a passive Red Sox fan, who never got to see this day.

I am thinking of all the people who have sent me a note in the past week, letting me know that I am the biggest fan they know, and just how happy they are for me.

I am thinking about two life-long dreams, seeing the Sox win the World Series, and living abroad, colliding. (I am for the God of the Old Testament. A very spiteful, and vengeful god. Ask and Yee shall receive.)

I am thinking about the first time I went to Fenway with my dad. We saw the Brewers when they were still an American League team.

And I am thinking about the first, and only, time I marched through the green monster and on to the field to be greeted by Bobby Orr.

I am thinking about the first time I went to HHH Metrodome in Minneapolis, and realized just how lucky I was to be raised thinking Fenway was the norm.

I am thinking about that marathon game in July, where the Red Sox were swept at Yankee stadium. The two young boys sitting in front of us, crying, wearing Nomar jersey's, while their idol sulked in the dugout. I am thinking of two old friends, sitting in those stands that night, still proud to be fans. Taking it in.

But really, I am thinking about not thinking so much. Not thinking during the games, "what if we had", or "what if we hadn't", or "what if we did", or "what if we didn't". I am thinking about just letting it go.

The questions will, and have already come. "What will you do now? Your identity is crushed."
What will I do? Go on being a fan of the greatest team in the history of sports. Dish it out to some Yankee fans. And oh yeah, finally get some freaking sleep.

I just want to hear it once. You were right, Shaun. This was the year.

...Nuf Ced!

END.

I'll be in the stands for Game One. This A Year! Go Sox!