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Baseball Today: Tuesday, October 16 »

Projo SoxTalk with McAdam: A weak effort in Game Three

Click here to listen to today's edition of projo SoxTalk. The topics: letting Jake Westbrook off the hook; lack of production at the top and the bottom of the order; don't expect J.D. Drew to come out of the lineup; Daisuke Matsuzaka's postgame dejection; sticking with Tim Wakefield; and facing Paul Byrd.

Following are some excerpts from Sean's comments.

On possible lineup changes: "Before last night's game I asked about the possibility of [Jacoby] Ellsbury getting some playing time, specifically over Drew ... Terry Francona was pretty adament that that change didn't seem to be in the offing. Whether Crisp is vulnerable because of his lack of production, we didn't get into. I have to think that, given how much they value Crisp's defense, that change won't be made. But maybe if they lose again, and go down 3-1, then that's the opportunity to really shake things up. But I got the feeling last night that [Francona] wasn't leaning toward any sort of shakeup, and was going to stay with his regular lineup."

On Matsuzaka's postgame reaction, and his overall performance: "Dejected would be putting it mildly. Some two hours after he had come out of the game, he was sitting in front of his locker when we were in the clubhouse, just sort of staring blankly, still in uniform. He didn't take questions from the media, simply provided a pretty generic statement ... I thought some of those familiar problems reared their head again, including a lack of aggressiveness, and kind of nibbling and not trusting his stuff, and some of the things that have been the hallmark of Matsuzaka most of the season. And I think it's got to be considered a significant disappointment that in two postseason starts, he has not found a way to get out of the fifth inning."

Reaction to starting Wakefield tonight: "I guess the best way to put it is that I understand it, and it's sort of a sign of the times ... I don't know that you're ever going to see happen [again] what happened in 2003, when Jack McKeon brought Josh Beckett back on three days rest for game six of the 2003 World Series. And of course we know what happened there -- he shut them out in Yankee Stadium and the Marlins won. It seems that the game has changed to a degree where teams are incredibly protective of their pitching, particularly their young pitching in which they have a lot invested -- the Red Sox have $40 million invested in Josh Beckett. ... [and then, there is] the issue of, if you use Beckett tonight and he gets you even, that's fine, but how trustworthy are the guys behind him, how reliable are they? So they've decided to stay in turn, cross their fingers and hope that Wakefield pitches well tonight. If it pays off, it'll look very smart. If not, there will be a lot of second-guessing that could take them well into the winter."

Posted by Mike McDermott  at 10:31 AM to McAdam | Permalink

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deb | October 16, 2007 5:04 PM link