I wanted to wait a few days after the trade deadline passed just so I could digest what did or did not occur and get a feel for the team and what they are capable of doing the rest of the way.  I’m sure like myself, many of you have mixed emotions about what is going on.  The team is playing .500 ball, didn’t make one noticeable move at the trade deadline and lost Varitek and Nixon in back to back days on top of being without Wakefield, Foulke and Clement.  On top of that, Jason Johnson is an automatic loss, Kyle Snyder is awesome, for 4 innings, and Jon Lester still hasn’t figured out how to keep his pitch count down and get past 6 innings.  Also, I’m curious as to where Craig Hansen’s fastball has gone.  They changed his mechanics, but unfortunately the velocity went AWOL.  The icing on the cake is that the last three wins have been via walk-off, which can make you absolutely giddy for a day or so, but personally has me feeling nervous over the next two months., especially with the local 9 sitting smack dab in second place.

.500 Ball

Every good team plays .500 ball for a few weeks over the course of a season.  It’s inevitable.  However, when you start playing it is a whole other story.  The Yankees have this keen ability to play .500 early in the season and then peak right before the All Star break and then carry it forward to October.  That is how you want your momentum to flow.  The Sox never work within a pattern.  It comes and goes every year.  Ever since they ripped off the 12 straight (Do you even remember they did this?) they have been mediocre.  The thing that scares me about how they are playing is that everybody is struggling.  Aside from Big Papi, Manny, Gonzalez, Papelbon and Beckett (to a certain degree) everybody else is scuffling out there. Or learning the ropes, which is the same as scuffling for rookies.  With Papi and Manny in such a sweet groove, Youk and Loretta really need to do everything in their power to get on base.  If they did so at a .400 clip then that would probably mean 4-5 extra runs a game.  Why does this matter you ask, because the pitching is dreadful right now.  They need to pound teams into submission for a period of time, just to take the pressure off as well as let Wells work his pseudo-rehab starts.  They need to be taking 2 of 3 during every series.  I don’t care about sweeps.  2 of 3 is all I ask.

The Trade Deadline

The prospect of Andruw Jones coming here was too good to be true.  I would have given them Crisp, Hansen and a couple other prospects for Jones.  I’m surprised that Atlanta didn’t bite, because the other Jones (Chipper) is the fan favorite.   Speed, power and defense are the words to describe Jones.  Think he would have been a fan favorite?

Roy Oswalt.  Again, what a silly trade.  Silly in the “Holy crap we just got Roy Oswalt” kind of way.  Adding Oswalt to the mix would have been a nightmare for any team in the Sox path.

Clemens.  I’m calling this the pussyfoot deal.  The Sox were willing to do it and so were the Astros, but PR sensitive Clemens (when did this happen) and Drayton McLane (a bonafide dummy after this week) were the roadblocks to the deal.  If anything, it would have made for a fun trip to the Bronx.

I thought the rumored trading of Lowell and/or Loretta was dumb.  This team would be 12 games out without them and Lowell’s defense has single-handedly kept the pitching staff’s ERA down by 1 point.  Let’s not forget how we won in 2004.

I’m not one to believe the Yankees did anything more than absorb an albatross of a contract with Abreu.  He’s awful and this whole change of scenery thing is not going to matter.  What are they going to do with Craig Wilson with Giambi at first and Sheffield or Abreu DHing?  It’s strange, but I think they might have something in Lidle, who can pitch well…at least he has against the Sox and the Yankees.

Overall nobody made a trade that is going to tip the scales of any race.

Injuries

Theo must have wanted to die when Nixon went down Sunday and Tek’s knee imploded on Monday.  [NOTE:  Sal Fasano is available.  Please sign him and give his moustache a signing bonus too.  Please oh please.]  That is just terrible timing.  The Nixon injury is fine, because we all have been pining for WiMo and he hasn’t failed to deliver.  We’ve seen one homerun land on Thompson Island and another almost decapitate a fan.  Now that’s what I call fun.  The Varitek issue is obviously the worst to absorb, because he is currently irreplaceable.  Mirabelli has been around these guys for a while so I’m not worried about his handling of the pitchers, but his bat is frozen in 2004 and nowhere to be found.  This is also on the heels of Varitek coming out of his season long hitting slump so it makes this injury extra painful.  This, plus the pitching situation, is going to determine whether or not the Sox are playing in October or not.

Now as of 8/4 the Sox swung a deal for Baltimore’s Javy Lopez, thus ensuring the Sox corner the market on all Javier Lopez’s.  Take that Steinbrenner.  I dare you to corner the market on all Giambi’s!  Who knows what Javy will bring to the table, but I can only imagine he’s a better option than Ken Huckaby.  After watching Beckett implode last night you have to imagine that Huckaby is partially to blame.

What’s next?

If the team blows it you can make a bunch of excuses as to why, but to tell you the truth if the Yankees win the division outright then it solidifies our inferiority to them.  That team was devastated by injuries and a lack of a pitching staff yet here we are in August and the Yankees are in first place and we’re in a .500 free fall and the Twins are red hot so the Wild Card is not an option.  None of this makes me feel good at all.