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Don't Mess With Dice-K

Dice-K Mania keeps making its presence felt, sometimes more often than Terry Francona would prefer. The latest example was brought on by Thursday's rainout.

Because of the postponement, the Sox shifted their rotation a bit, skipping Julian Tavares and moving Daisuke Matsuzaka back a day, from Monday to Tuesday. It seemed like a reasonable move, all the more so since many Japanese teams use six-man rotations, meaning starters get five days rest between starts.

But anything involving Dice-K creates news in Japan. In the middle of his pre-game media briefing this afternoon, one of the two dozen or so Japanese reporters asked Francona if he was aware that pushing back Matsuzaka back a day had created a stir in Japan.

``I’m aware of that,’’ the manager responded. ``I found out the hard way.’’

Francona tried to explain how he felt he was helping both his team and Matsuzaka by making the move, one that includes keeping Josh Beckett and Curt Schilling in their normal rotation.

``I thought I explained it pretty forthright,’’ Francona said. ``We’re trying to eliminate a lot of possibilities. There’s a pretty good chance it’s going to rain Monday. The weather up here is crazy, as you’ll come to learn, as I’m coming to learn. There’s a pretty good chance we’re going to play Tuesday night (in Toronto). Unless something happens to that dome, we’re going to play. So we’re tying to give people targets to shoot for and get a guy on schedule. I’m shocked with how the news was taken.’’

One of the Boston writers joked that no one from the area would ever question a move like that.

``At least not to my face,’’ Francona shot back.

Posted by Paul Kenyon  at 5:14 PM | Permalink