Breslow was unavailable because he needs to stay in the minors for at least 10 days after his demotion unless there is an injury.

Agree 100%.

Do they think Papi and Manny will be hitting like this forever?

No, Manny is a FA after 2007 and Ortiz is a big man. Ortiz wont last forever and Manny will be allowed to walk once an option yr comes available. This duo will be together for one more yr, then the offense will be mediocre like it was in 99-00.

Well Beckett went 5 and 2/3 weak innings, forcing them to go to the 'pen, and they got hit again.

ok, don't overreact. What makes you think Hughes is going to be any better than our pitchers? Have you seen him play often or are you just talking out of frustration because he plays for the Yanks? Lester was rushed. I still think he'll be very good when ready.

I'm not really worried about that. I have confidence that the FO knows how to build an offense and evaluate hitters. It's the one and only thing they've been consistently good at. They'll get somebody. We can buy bats.

What I have absolutely no confidence in is the ability to get pitchers. I'm getting to the point now where I'm assuming that every single pitcher we get will suck, just because we signed them.

Maybe we should just build an offense that can score 1300 runs and not bother with pitching.

Still, did anybody in their wildest dreams imagine that the pitching could be this bad over a 3-game stretch? This series is 100% on the pitchers themselves for crapping their pants. They weren't this bad last month.

Thanks for the free therapy, fellow rooters. Time to start drinking.

What the f*** does Phillip Hughes have to do with anything? Hansen, Delcarmen and Lester are rookie pitchers. Of course they were gonna hit the wall; I don't think you can say "Honestly, they all suck". And we have had injuries the entire season. We've never had our whole rotation at any point during the season.

I mean does Theo have something to do with this? Yes, he is the main contributor to our struggles by not getting a relief picher. But do you know what else is? Having starters who routinely cannot pitch deep into games, thus wearing down the 'pen.

Also, Tito should have had Youks at lead off the whole time. Coco is better in the #7 spot. So, you can't just say this is Theo's fault completly

This series should be blamed 100% upon the FO for putting the team in this position.

I'm am sad that the team is wasting such a golden opporotunity that they had. If only Theo had gotten off his ass, picked up Abreu, Oswalt, possibly Clemens, and another bat @ the deadline, it would be us up 3-0 in the series.

Rushing someone is the best way to completely ruin them. Hughes has been absolutely nasty this yr in AA. He had 3 starts in AA when he was first promoted that were subpar, then he absolutely dominated. His K/BB ratio is totally nasty and his BAA is amazing. Hughes projects as an ace one day, but he clearly is not ready to be a MLB pitcher yet and they will let him develop. The yankees have bought time for guys like Hughes, Clippard, Kennedy, Chamberlain, Betances etc to develop. The sox didnt do that, and their equivalents are now in the majors getting ruined.

honestly, that is one thing that the yankees do better than anyone. They bring in their rookies in low pressure situations and coddle them until they have enough confidence to stand alone. Cano last yr was put into an amazing offense batting 9th and was left alone. Cabrera was brought up prematurely last yr, the yanks learned their lesson and made sure he could hit in AAA before he was promoted. Then he was placed in the 9 spot in a no pressure spot in LF and he is playing well. Wang came up as an injury replacement against the blue jays and was essentially coddled along in obscurity behind RJ, Mussina and Pavano.

100%? Have you ever been more appalled by a display of pitching in your life? No, right? Because we haven't seen it at all this year. The pitching has been historically bad for the last 3 games. That's the pitchers' fault for sucking so bad that nobody could reasonably expect them to suck like that. These guys aren't as bad as they're pitching right now. I'm not saying they're good, either, but they sure as hell aren't THIS bad.

Also, the idea that we could have gotten Abreu, Oswalt, Clemens, and another bat at the deadline is ludicrous. There's no way they could pull that off. Oswalt and Clemens weren't even on the block.

Unbelieveable. Absolutely Un-goddamn-believeable. I woke up twenty minutes ago hoping we'd come out with a win today. Instead, we allowed the Devil's Bitches to score ANOTHER f**cking 12+ runs. 36 runs in under 36 hours. I don't even know what to say at this point.

This is nauseating. This is a nightmare. This team is horrible, and they are not making the playoffs.

I don't care if they're on tv tomorrow. I'm not watching. I wouldn't care if I had Monster Seat tickets tomorrow. I wouldn't go. I'd sell them and buy a cattle prod to jam into my crotch at random intervals during the day. It might be slightly less painful than our watching out bullpen piss the season away.

Thank God college football and the EPL start soon.

[codebox] NY Yankees ab r h 2b 3b hr rbi w k avg.
Damon, Johnny dh 6 1 3 3 0 0 1 0 0 .297
Jeter, Derek ss 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 .335
Abreu, Bobby rf 4 2 1 1 0 0 0 2 2 .392
Guiel, Aaron rf 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .235
Giambi, Jason 1b 2 2 1 1 0 0 0 3 0 .256
Wilson, Craig pr-1b 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 .259
Rodriguez, Alex 3b 3 2 1 1 0 0 2 2 1 .288
Green, Nick 3b 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .187
Cano, Robinson 2b 3 2 2 0 0 1 5 2 0 .330
Posada, Jorge c 4 0 1 0 1 0 4 1 0 .270
Fasano, Sal pr-c 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .130
Williams, Bernie cf 4 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 1 .282
Cabrera, Melky lf 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 .291
Totals 35 13 10 6 1 2 13 13 7

Boston ab r h 2b 3b hr rbi w k avg.
Youkilis, Kevin 1b 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 .292
Loretta, Mark 2b 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 .308
Ortiz, David dh 2 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 .284
Ramirez, Manny lf 1 1 1 0 0 1 3 2 0 .327
Hinske, Eric ph-lf 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 .268
Lopez, Javy c 4 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 .265
Lowell, Mike 3b 4 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 .286
Pena, Wily Mo rf 4 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 .301
Kapler, Gabe cf 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 .226
Cora, Alex ss 3 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .285
Totals 28 5 5 0 0 1 5 6 4

NY Yankees 0 2 1 0 2 5 0 3 0 -- 13
Boston 0 0 0 4 1 0 0 0 0 -- 5

LOB_NY Yankees 9, Boston 5. 2B_J.Damon 3, B.Abreu, J.Giambi, A.Rodriguez.
3B_J.Posada. HR_B.Williams (9) off J.Beckett, R.Cano (8) off J.Van Buren,
M.Ramirez (34) off R.Johnson. SF_D.Ortiz. S_D.Jeter, M.Loretta. SB_B.Abreu
(7), J.Posada (2), M.Cabrera (10). GIDP_A.Rodriguez, M.Lowell, G.Kapler.
DP_NY Yankees 2 (R.Cano, D.Jeter and J.Giambi), (D.Jeter, R.Cano and
J.Giambi); Boston 1 (A.Cora, M.Loretta and K.Youkilis).

NY Yankees IP H R ER BB SO HR PC-ST ERA
Johnson, Randy (W 14-9) 7 4 5 5 6 3 1 112-61 4.98
Wright, Jaret 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 22-15 4.50
Beam, TJ 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 20-12 10.50

Boston IP H R ER BB SO HR PC-ST ERA
Beckett, Josh (L 13-8) 5 2-3 7 9 9 9 2 1 121-58 5.35
Delcarmen, Manny 1-3 1 1 1 1 0 0 12-4 4.38
Van Buren, Jermaine 1 1-3 2 3 3 2 2 1 39-20 11.77
Snyder, Kyle 1 2-3 0 0 0 1 3 0 27-17 6.35

PB_J.Lopez.
IBB_off R.Johnson (M.Ramirez), off J.Beckett (R.Cano).
HBP_by R.Johnson (A.Cora).
T_3:41. A_35,738.
Umpires_Home, Joe West; First, Ed Rapuano;
Second, Tony Randazzo; Third, Jim Wolf.[/codebox]

He should have NEVER been sent down..another Theo blunder...Hansen cannot even get through an inning without giving up a run or two..or three..or four..he is absolutely DREADFUL...talk about Overhyped. Craig Hansen should have been sent down a long time ago...along with a swift kick in the ass. I know he is young...but the way he was hyped it was like we had another Huston Street.....he pitches more like Picaboo Street. Hansen..Delcarmen..Lester..all suck and are nowhere near ready to pitch in meaningful games. I am appalled that Theo pinned his hopes on these kids. It is not their fault..and when I say they "suck",,they DO! Right now...at this point in time...as major league pitchers, THEY ARE HORRIFIC! None of them should be in the Majors and had Theo done his job and realized this, we would have had adequate major league replacements for them and allowed them to season in AAA... Instead, Theo f'd up the season and may have set them back in their development by making Tito go to them and then subsequently getting their brains beaten in.

On another note..Mike Timlin should just hang'em up.. he is a trooper and a great guy..but his arm has been overused and he has nothing left.

We simply dont have the bats to offset our pitching deficiencies. I dont think that even the MFY have the bats to offset the gaps in pitching we have. That being said, I'm hardly an optimist but at least where I sit the bright spots so far have been:

1) Tavarez really impressed me yesterday by calming the storm in Game 2.

2) Foulke didn't serve up hanging sliders for the MFY to send onto the turnpike.

3) Kyle Snyder may have found a niche in a middle inning relief role which will likely be a busy role given the Johnson/Lester/Beckett debacle over the past few weeks.

4) Wakefield and Varitek are two days closer to being well.

5) THE Stopper is up tomorrow.

6) Wells' control and command have returned of late; if he can place the fastball we take the next 2 and have only lost a game.

I can't remember an entire pitching staff collapsing like this(yes, even Paps has had a few rough outings lately). Some of that must be due to Tek's absence, but a lot of it might simply be due to the fact that these golden kids aren't as good as we'd been led to believe.
It's starting to look like Theo massively overrated his own farm system.

Still too late for Hansen/Lester/DelWalkman for Oswalt??

Fixed.

I agree. But what does that have to do with the fact that Hughes is a prospect and Lester isn't? We're not nursing our prospects and we risk really ruining them, especially Hansen, who seems to be crashing big time, but this doesn't mean they don't have talent.

Hansen, Lester and Delcarmen shouldn't have been allowed to be near an MLB mound this year, but we had to bring them up due to injuries and not having contingency plans. But really, to me, this doesn't mean they are worthless. In fact, they all showed flashes of brilliance, which is the most we can expect at this stage of their development.

Hughes is killing opponents in AA? That's exactly what Hansen, Delcarmen and Lester would (and should) be doing in AAA. To me, they are legit prospects that we are an inch away from wasting for good, without them helping the big league club at all. But I find it comical that some people (not you) are judging them to be poor players based on what they're doing this year. Remember, Papelbon was brought up at the age of 25. If we saw him at 22, he would have been shelled, but he is probably the strongest Rookie of the Year candidate. Sometimes players just need time. Is Lester a great player? No, but he might be. And he might be poor. He's still just a prospect, or a project, but this season's performance is not an indication of his future, at all.

I agree with you. You always make sure you bring up your players with the caveat that you give them the best chance possible to succeed. Throwing them into much needed roles down the stretch of a Boston-NYY pennant race that the sox are currently losing is the easiest way to make them question their stuff. Hansen, Lester, et al should be dominating AAA right now instead of getting the shit kicked out of them in Fenway against the yankees.

Note to Schilldro...learn how to type please. I find it very hard to read your writing.

I agree 100% but unfourtantly for me I don't watch college football :/. I guess now is the time to get into it?

You compared the Sox prospects/rookies to the MFYs prospects telling me that Hughes is still in the minors and our prospects are just rushed and that is the reason they are failing. I provided an example, using your logic of another team that did not rush to show the opposite impact on a team that did rush their prosects. My point, for your clarification, is that rushing is not necessarily the problem. The problem is that they will not be as good as you and others would like us to believe if they had more seasoning. It's not about if they suck. It's about the fact that it's not always about seasoning and that they are overvalued and we should sell high.

Obviously, you've never read one of my posts on Hansen. I believe he projects as a middle relief/set up guy AT BEST. If a flas hof brilliance is that fact he gets 2 guys to hit hard ground balls at them and manages to strike one guy out for one inning every three games, then our definition of brilliance is different.

And now Jered Weaver is a great player? 2 months into his career? He's had great results but I would not call him a great player with 8-10 weeks of experience after going through the league once. He would be one we should compare as Weaver was drafted the same time as Hansen. This is why I used him as an example as to why people can't keep making excuses for Hansen, MDC and Lester. While Weaver is not great yet, he's had alot more success than the afforementioned.

As for Hansen not being a superstar closer, we paid a HUGE signing bonus for him, gave him a major league contract, and the FO told everyone that he had Lidge-like (circa 2004) stuff. The FO projected him to be a stud closer. He has poor mechanics, flat stuff and shows little aggressiveness out on the mound.

His mechanics are not bad and his stuff is not flat. He's had five bad outings this year - last year he pitched for St.John's, which is like pitching for Lowell. By your standards, Koufax would have been a washed up bum because it took him five years in the majors to develop. Give the guy a break.

He was also pitching very well for AAA this year as a starter as well.

You know how I know that you're gay?