The Bosox make their second visit to SkyDome on the season, still in first place (if no longer by themselves in the top spot). After the Jays' disheartening defeat yesterday, four games with the Red Sox does not exactly seem to be a welcome tonic for the bullpen blues.
Still, there is reason for optimism. Boston's still missing two key bats, and several 2003 mashers (see, e.g., Mueller, Bill; Ortiz, David) have been rather ordinary offensive players in 2004. And while tonight's opponent, Curt Schilling, has been outstanding this season, the Jays have been the only team in the AL to have roughed him up this season -- and they've done it twice. Can beating The Drum help us beat the Red Sox? We'll see...
Finally, I'd like to apologize to one and all for not scouting the Royals' series. Alas, real life occasionally interferes.
On to the Advance Scout!
* With the Yankees’ win this afternoon, the Sox enter tonight’s game in a dead heat for first in the East, with the Orioles just a game back ... Boston would easily have been in first were it not for Cleveland’s surprisingly spunky play against the Red Sox. The Tribe took 4 of 7 from the favoured Beantowners ... Terry Francona has impressed his players and the ever-present Red Sox media with his pre-game preparations ...
* Tonight's starter, the classy Curt Schilling, has delivered as advertised for the Red Sox ... Always a workhorse, Schilling's gone at least six innings in every start and boasts an amazing 7/53 BB/K ratio in 51 1/3 innings ... Last Saturday, Schilling logged his 80th career complete game, a tremendous total in today's baseball ... Schilling said that he was inspired to make stamina a training goal after learning from 1955 Game 7 hero Johnny Podres, who told him “You make your reputation as a starter pitching in the big leagues after the sixth inning” when Curt was toiling in the minors ... One good omen: Schilling's ERA is 6.32 in two starts against the Jays this season -- and 1.26 in five starts against everyone else ... Do it again, Gomez! ...
* Speaking of “delivered as advertised,” Keith Foulke has been superb ... He’s converted all seven save opportunities. He hasn’t blown a save in his last 21 opportunities, dating back to last season ... Foulke gave up a meaningless run on April 17 -- his only run allowed in 19 IP (0.47 ERA) ... Righties are hitting .167 off him, and they’re the lucky ones. Lefties are floundering at .128 off Foulke ...
* Gloveman Pokey Reese is hitting just .233/.277/.300 off righthanded pitching ... Still, the slap-hitting infielder hit both of his home runs this season in the same game -- Saturday afternoon against Kansas City ... One of his homers was an inside-the-park job, as Juan Gonzalez struggled with the crazy bounce off the fence down by Pesky's Pole ... Then, he launched one into the Monster seats, earning a roaring curtain call ... He had been on a thirteen-month homerless streak ... A jubilant Reese after the game: "I want to be known as an all-around player" ... Even the curmudgeonly Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe likes the popular Pokey: “[T]he least anyone can say about the way he’s handled [shortstop] is that he has been an utter comfort for the pitchers and a complete pleasure for the rest of us to watch” ...
* Tomorrow’s starter, Derek Lowe, still has a sinker that sinks. But that’s the highest praise you can pay him about his season thus far ... Lowe’s 5.01 ERA is deceptively low; he’s given up nine unearned runs to accompany his 18 earned runs ... In 32 1/3 IP, he’s walked 16 batters while striking out only 15 ... He walked five Royals last Sunday in just 5 2/3 innings ... Lowe on his subpar outing: “Personally, I’m disgusted with the way I pitched” ...
* Kevin Mill-ahhhh has hit in ten of his last eleven games, and has followed a pedestrian .218/.295/.346 April with a sizzling .425/.489/.500 May in 40 at-bats ... He’s scored a run in four of his last five ...
* Bill Mueller, Millar’s near-homonym, has also scored in four of his last five ... But his stellar 2003 looks more and more like a career season as 2004 progresses. He’s hitting just .250 on the season ... Though he hasn’t been anything special as a lefthanded hitter this year, he’s been very weak from the right side (.204/.250/.367) ... He’s suffered from some bad luck, though; he blasted a ball to left off Jaime Cerda on Sunday afternoon that appeared to be a game-tying grand slam, before it hooked foul ...
* Saturday’s starter, Bronson Arroyo, makes his return to the rotation after the much-maligned (yes, the cliche can be used here without hyperbole) Byung-Hyun Kim was sent down to AAA Pawtucket ... Arroyo’s last two starts before being bumped for the higher-ceilinged Kim were both very solid. Going six innings in each, he racked up a combined line of 12 IP, 7 H, 4 R, 4 BB, 9 K ... The Jays got to him for four runs in the Sox home opener in April ... Arroyo on his chance to start: “I’ve just got to step in and run with it” ...
* Kim says he’s physically fine, but a warning note to Bauxites suggesting that he might be ripe for the picking on the trade market: His fastball was clocked between 82 and 86 mph throughout his last start ... Theo Epstein: “He’s healthy...Hopefully, through some shorter stints, we can get his velocity back” ... Kim has refused to scale back on his feverish workout campaign, which involves late-night running and lots of pitching on the side, which may be contributing to his apparently tired arm ... Doug Mirabelli: “How can you say someone works too hard? But his success is related directly to velocity” ... Theo Epstein: “His assimilation has been an even bigger challenge than we thought” ...
* 27-year-old rookie Jamie Brown was called up to replace Arroyo in the bullpen ... Brown was a solid 3-1, 2.84 in Pawtucket, with just two walks in 38 innings ... Francona: “He attacks the strike zone” ...
* David Ortiz has slumped badly in May, hitting just .194 and getting on base at a mere .241 rate ...
* Larry Lucchino is among the driving forces for the World Cup of Baseball to happen in 2005, and every four years thereafter ...
* Johnny Damon isn't running as much this season, but is 5-for-6 on the basepaths ... He's racked up 17 walks and only 11 Ks ... He’s hit in five of his last six (.370) ...
* Jason Varitek keeps getting better and better as a hitter ... His .311/.418/.534 line is outstanding generally, not just “for a catcher” ... He’s tough to pitch to; impressively, he’s hitting over .300 from each side of the plate ... The 230-pounder even stole two bases in a game last Saturday ...
* Doug Mirabelli’s been an excellent caddy for ‘Tek ... With two more doubles last night, Mirabelli’s up to 10 for 24 on the season (.417/.481/.958) ... Give Doug high marks for professionalism, keeping ready despite only playing every fifth day or so ... He’s staying modest about his gaudy stats: “I’ve had only 25 at-bats. I don’t think you can make too much of that” ...
* On Monday night, Brian Daubach hit his first home run in his return tour with the Bosox ... Daubach couldn’t recall his last assist, but playing left for the citizenship-seeking Manny Ramirez, he nailed Travis Hafner at second after playing a Green Monster drive effectively ...
* Gizzi fave Mark Malaska has held lefties to a mere .200 average ... Malaska’s recent struggles, including a costly bases-clearing double allowed to Carlos Beltran on Sunday, have been attributed to his rushing on the mound ...
* Alan Embree, meanwhile, has been absolutely buzzing lefties, who are hitting just .107 off him ...
* Sunday’s starter, Pedro Martinez, has been solid but not really Pedro this season, except for a dominating outing in the Bronx ... He was roughed up badly by both the Orioles and Rangers ... His last two starts, though, have both been very good: 14 IP, 9 H, 4 R, 5 BB, 19 K ... Both of his earned runs on Tuesday night were allowed in the first inning, before he had a callus removed from his pitching hand and then proceeded to shut Cleveland down in innings 2 through 7 ... He retired 16 straight hitters at one point ... Pedro threw 52 pitches in the first two innings, before making it through the next five innings with 63 additional pitches ... On 67 occasions, Martinez has reached double digits in Ks. Roger Clemens holds the club record with 68 ...
* Give Manny Ramirez credit. He could have sulked after being first waived, and then shopped openly, this offseason ... All he’s done is remain one of the premier power hitters in recent memory, going .357/.432/.620 on the season -- fifth, fourth and fourth in the AL respectively... He’s also tied for fourth in the league with eight homers ... Ramirez missed Monday’s game against the Tribe, but there’s no mystery to this story; he was being sworn in as a United States citizen in Miami ... Manny’s US citizenship will help him out immensely for tax purposes as he tries to get his new charitable foundation off the ground ...
* Mark Bellhorn’s prodigious walk total (29) is responsible for his unusual .221/.384/.381 season line ... Unfortunately, in his last eight games, he’s walked just twice while whiffing 15 times ... Lefthanded pitching has been giving the switch-hitter fits (.162/.340/.243) ... Bellhorn couldn’t hold up his swing on strike three last night to end the game ... Bellhorn on the K: “Anytime you see a lot of pitches and get deep into the count, you’re going to strike out some...But I wasn’t looking for a walk there. In that situation, you definitely want to hit” ...
* The injury to Trot Nixon gave Gabe Kapler an opportunity to earn some regular playing time. He has not risen to the challenge ... His season line sits at .238/.264/.286, and eighteen of the powerfully-built Kapler’s twenty hits have been singles ... He hasn’t walked since April 24 ...
* David McCarty came up with a huge pinch-hit triple on Tuesday night to win the game ... He was also the team’s emergency pitcher, had the game gone into extra innings ...
* For the first time since spring training, Nomar Garciaparra took batting practice this week ... He's still a couple of weeks away from returning from his Achilles injury ... Garciaparra will not make the trip to Toronto. Nomar brushed aside criticism from the ESPN Baseball Tonight crew about his not sitting in the dugout every night; Garciaparra said that his presence in the dugout during his long-term wrist injury forced him to rush back into action prematurely -- and that he had made peace with his teammates on his rehab schedule ...
* Trot Nixon returned to the club’s Ft. Myers training facility to begin rehabbing his left quadriceps ...
* Boston’s coach at third is, of all people, Dale Sveum ... In a sad-sounding nickname that would make an NHLer blush, Pokey Reese calls him “Sveumer” ...
* Meanwhile, first-base coach Lynn Jones underwent eye surgery on Monday for a “screwdriver-related accident” that must have been unimaginably awful ...
Probable Batting Orders
Note: The Jays will not be starting a lefthander this series.
vs. RH
8 Damon
4 Bellhorn
DH Ortiz
7 Ramirez
3/9 Millar
2 Varitek
5 Mueller
9 Kapler/3 McCarty/3 Daubach
6 Reese
Pitching Probables
Thursday: RH Schilling vs. Batista
Friday: RH Lowe vs. Miller
Saturday: RH Arroyo vs. Hentgen
Sunday: RH Martinez vs. Halladay
Bullpen Usage
Long: Malaska L, Brown R
Short: Timlin R, DiNardo L
Setup: Embree L, Williamson R
Closer: Foulke R
Still, there is reason for optimism. Boston's still missing two key bats, and several 2003 mashers (see, e.g., Mueller, Bill; Ortiz, David) have been rather ordinary offensive players in 2004. And while tonight's opponent, Curt Schilling, has been outstanding this season, the Jays have been the only team in the AL to have roughed him up this season -- and they've done it twice. Can beating The Drum help us beat the Red Sox? We'll see...
Finally, I'd like to apologize to one and all for not scouting the Royals' series. Alas, real life occasionally interferes.
On to the Advance Scout!
* With the Yankees’ win this afternoon, the Sox enter tonight’s game in a dead heat for first in the East, with the Orioles just a game back ... Boston would easily have been in first were it not for Cleveland’s surprisingly spunky play against the Red Sox. The Tribe took 4 of 7 from the favoured Beantowners ... Terry Francona has impressed his players and the ever-present Red Sox media with his pre-game preparations ...
* Tonight's starter, the classy Curt Schilling, has delivered as advertised for the Red Sox ... Always a workhorse, Schilling's gone at least six innings in every start and boasts an amazing 7/53 BB/K ratio in 51 1/3 innings ... Last Saturday, Schilling logged his 80th career complete game, a tremendous total in today's baseball ... Schilling said that he was inspired to make stamina a training goal after learning from 1955 Game 7 hero Johnny Podres, who told him “You make your reputation as a starter pitching in the big leagues after the sixth inning” when Curt was toiling in the minors ... One good omen: Schilling's ERA is 6.32 in two starts against the Jays this season -- and 1.26 in five starts against everyone else ... Do it again, Gomez! ...
* Speaking of “delivered as advertised,” Keith Foulke has been superb ... He’s converted all seven save opportunities. He hasn’t blown a save in his last 21 opportunities, dating back to last season ... Foulke gave up a meaningless run on April 17 -- his only run allowed in 19 IP (0.47 ERA) ... Righties are hitting .167 off him, and they’re the lucky ones. Lefties are floundering at .128 off Foulke ...
* Gloveman Pokey Reese is hitting just .233/.277/.300 off righthanded pitching ... Still, the slap-hitting infielder hit both of his home runs this season in the same game -- Saturday afternoon against Kansas City ... One of his homers was an inside-the-park job, as Juan Gonzalez struggled with the crazy bounce off the fence down by Pesky's Pole ... Then, he launched one into the Monster seats, earning a roaring curtain call ... He had been on a thirteen-month homerless streak ... A jubilant Reese after the game: "I want to be known as an all-around player" ... Even the curmudgeonly Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe likes the popular Pokey: “[T]he least anyone can say about the way he’s handled [shortstop] is that he has been an utter comfort for the pitchers and a complete pleasure for the rest of us to watch” ...
* Tomorrow’s starter, Derek Lowe, still has a sinker that sinks. But that’s the highest praise you can pay him about his season thus far ... Lowe’s 5.01 ERA is deceptively low; he’s given up nine unearned runs to accompany his 18 earned runs ... In 32 1/3 IP, he’s walked 16 batters while striking out only 15 ... He walked five Royals last Sunday in just 5 2/3 innings ... Lowe on his subpar outing: “Personally, I’m disgusted with the way I pitched” ...
* Kevin Mill-ahhhh has hit in ten of his last eleven games, and has followed a pedestrian .218/.295/.346 April with a sizzling .425/.489/.500 May in 40 at-bats ... He’s scored a run in four of his last five ...
* Bill Mueller, Millar’s near-homonym, has also scored in four of his last five ... But his stellar 2003 looks more and more like a career season as 2004 progresses. He’s hitting just .250 on the season ... Though he hasn’t been anything special as a lefthanded hitter this year, he’s been very weak from the right side (.204/.250/.367) ... He’s suffered from some bad luck, though; he blasted a ball to left off Jaime Cerda on Sunday afternoon that appeared to be a game-tying grand slam, before it hooked foul ...
* Saturday’s starter, Bronson Arroyo, makes his return to the rotation after the much-maligned (yes, the cliche can be used here without hyperbole) Byung-Hyun Kim was sent down to AAA Pawtucket ... Arroyo’s last two starts before being bumped for the higher-ceilinged Kim were both very solid. Going six innings in each, he racked up a combined line of 12 IP, 7 H, 4 R, 4 BB, 9 K ... The Jays got to him for four runs in the Sox home opener in April ... Arroyo on his chance to start: “I’ve just got to step in and run with it” ...
* Kim says he’s physically fine, but a warning note to Bauxites suggesting that he might be ripe for the picking on the trade market: His fastball was clocked between 82 and 86 mph throughout his last start ... Theo Epstein: “He’s healthy...Hopefully, through some shorter stints, we can get his velocity back” ... Kim has refused to scale back on his feverish workout campaign, which involves late-night running and lots of pitching on the side, which may be contributing to his apparently tired arm ... Doug Mirabelli: “How can you say someone works too hard? But his success is related directly to velocity” ... Theo Epstein: “His assimilation has been an even bigger challenge than we thought” ...
* 27-year-old rookie Jamie Brown was called up to replace Arroyo in the bullpen ... Brown was a solid 3-1, 2.84 in Pawtucket, with just two walks in 38 innings ... Francona: “He attacks the strike zone” ...
* David Ortiz has slumped badly in May, hitting just .194 and getting on base at a mere .241 rate ...
* Larry Lucchino is among the driving forces for the World Cup of Baseball to happen in 2005, and every four years thereafter ...
* Johnny Damon isn't running as much this season, but is 5-for-6 on the basepaths ... He's racked up 17 walks and only 11 Ks ... He’s hit in five of his last six (.370) ...
* Jason Varitek keeps getting better and better as a hitter ... His .311/.418/.534 line is outstanding generally, not just “for a catcher” ... He’s tough to pitch to; impressively, he’s hitting over .300 from each side of the plate ... The 230-pounder even stole two bases in a game last Saturday ...
* Doug Mirabelli’s been an excellent caddy for ‘Tek ... With two more doubles last night, Mirabelli’s up to 10 for 24 on the season (.417/.481/.958) ... Give Doug high marks for professionalism, keeping ready despite only playing every fifth day or so ... He’s staying modest about his gaudy stats: “I’ve had only 25 at-bats. I don’t think you can make too much of that” ...
* On Monday night, Brian Daubach hit his first home run in his return tour with the Bosox ... Daubach couldn’t recall his last assist, but playing left for the citizenship-seeking Manny Ramirez, he nailed Travis Hafner at second after playing a Green Monster drive effectively ...
* Gizzi fave Mark Malaska has held lefties to a mere .200 average ... Malaska’s recent struggles, including a costly bases-clearing double allowed to Carlos Beltran on Sunday, have been attributed to his rushing on the mound ...
* Alan Embree, meanwhile, has been absolutely buzzing lefties, who are hitting just .107 off him ...
* Sunday’s starter, Pedro Martinez, has been solid but not really Pedro this season, except for a dominating outing in the Bronx ... He was roughed up badly by both the Orioles and Rangers ... His last two starts, though, have both been very good: 14 IP, 9 H, 4 R, 5 BB, 19 K ... Both of his earned runs on Tuesday night were allowed in the first inning, before he had a callus removed from his pitching hand and then proceeded to shut Cleveland down in innings 2 through 7 ... He retired 16 straight hitters at one point ... Pedro threw 52 pitches in the first two innings, before making it through the next five innings with 63 additional pitches ... On 67 occasions, Martinez has reached double digits in Ks. Roger Clemens holds the club record with 68 ...
* Give Manny Ramirez credit. He could have sulked after being first waived, and then shopped openly, this offseason ... All he’s done is remain one of the premier power hitters in recent memory, going .357/.432/.620 on the season -- fifth, fourth and fourth in the AL respectively... He’s also tied for fourth in the league with eight homers ... Ramirez missed Monday’s game against the Tribe, but there’s no mystery to this story; he was being sworn in as a United States citizen in Miami ... Manny’s US citizenship will help him out immensely for tax purposes as he tries to get his new charitable foundation off the ground ...
* Mark Bellhorn’s prodigious walk total (29) is responsible for his unusual .221/.384/.381 season line ... Unfortunately, in his last eight games, he’s walked just twice while whiffing 15 times ... Lefthanded pitching has been giving the switch-hitter fits (.162/.340/.243) ... Bellhorn couldn’t hold up his swing on strike three last night to end the game ... Bellhorn on the K: “Anytime you see a lot of pitches and get deep into the count, you’re going to strike out some...But I wasn’t looking for a walk there. In that situation, you definitely want to hit” ...
* The injury to Trot Nixon gave Gabe Kapler an opportunity to earn some regular playing time. He has not risen to the challenge ... His season line sits at .238/.264/.286, and eighteen of the powerfully-built Kapler’s twenty hits have been singles ... He hasn’t walked since April 24 ...
* David McCarty came up with a huge pinch-hit triple on Tuesday night to win the game ... He was also the team’s emergency pitcher, had the game gone into extra innings ...
* For the first time since spring training, Nomar Garciaparra took batting practice this week ... He's still a couple of weeks away from returning from his Achilles injury ... Garciaparra will not make the trip to Toronto. Nomar brushed aside criticism from the ESPN Baseball Tonight crew about his not sitting in the dugout every night; Garciaparra said that his presence in the dugout during his long-term wrist injury forced him to rush back into action prematurely -- and that he had made peace with his teammates on his rehab schedule ...
* Trot Nixon returned to the club’s Ft. Myers training facility to begin rehabbing his left quadriceps ...
* Boston’s coach at third is, of all people, Dale Sveum ... In a sad-sounding nickname that would make an NHLer blush, Pokey Reese calls him “Sveumer” ...
* Meanwhile, first-base coach Lynn Jones underwent eye surgery on Monday for a “screwdriver-related accident” that must have been unimaginably awful ...
Probable Batting Orders
Note: The Jays will not be starting a lefthander this series.
vs. RH
8 Damon
4 Bellhorn
DH Ortiz
7 Ramirez
3/9 Millar
2 Varitek
5 Mueller
9 Kapler/3 McCarty/3 Daubach
6 Reese
Pitching Probables
Thursday: RH Schilling vs. Batista
Friday: RH Lowe vs. Miller
Saturday: RH Arroyo vs. Hentgen
Sunday: RH Martinez vs. Halladay
Bullpen Usage
Long: Malaska L, Brown R
Short: Timlin R, DiNardo L
Setup: Embree L, Williamson R
Closer: Foulke R
