For starters, our pitching has been pitiful. That's what it boils down to. The offense has been somewhat productive, but the production is only coming from a select few. It's great to see Ortiz hitting for power. Adrian Gonzalez looks to be an incredibly pure hitter and something to be excited about. Jacoby Ellsbury is showing that he is capable of leading off this lineup. But those have been the biggest bright spots. Carl Crawford is still hitless in a Sox uniform, and he hasn't looked pretty doing it. Jarrod Saltalamacchia has been equally inept connecting the bat with the ball. But the offense has at least been manageable. After all, they can't be the most optimistic unit up there when their pitching staff spots the opposition leads that a grand slam would hardly chop into.
Lester was good for stretches, but he was off his game for the most part. Lackey, meanwhile, got boom roasted. Completely torched for 9 runs in less than 4 innings of work, including a big fly for a grand slam by old teammate Adrian Beltre. The bullpen has been equally bad with a few exceptions. Bard got wrecked in the opener. Last night, it felt like no one was capable of retiring a Ranger. It's clearly no reason to panic, but if the Sox will win 100 games -- hell, if they will even win the AL East (the Yankees are still good, you know) -- they will need to clean up their act on the mound. I know last season was injury-decimated, but it was also plagued by drastic underachieving from the pitching staff. Boston can't afford another similar season of production from those guys.
They play 162 games in a season. The Sox can still go 160-2. Or they could also go 2-160. The talk is irrelevant. No one ever won a world series from media praise. They win the rings by playing the game. There are 29 other teams out there trying to achieve the same goal. You have to earn everything you get. Hopefully it's a fun and successful summer and not a repeat of last year's dog days.
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