I didn't even realize until this morning that the Blue Jays finished 2nd in the AL East, making Boston finish 3rd! :beer: Here Here! To Boston sucking this season!
Hopefully this failure will lead back to Lucchino having more pull, as he has more of a "win now" attitude than Epstein, who's more of a "save money and pretend to be serious about contending" guy.
And people think Yankee fans are fickle? Nice job Jays! When was the last time Boston finished lower than 2nd in the ALE? I don't even remember.
Not really. The core of that team was from the Duquette era. Pedro, Wakefield, Lowe, Manny, Nixon, Varitek, Embree, and Nomar for half the year. Most of those guys are gone, or will be soon, because they aren't "Theo's guys". I don't like Epstein, and I haven't since the Nomar trade.
I agree, Epstein is incredibly overrated. He made the moves to put Boston over the top in 2004, but let's really look at that offseason--he signed the best closer on the market (Foulke), traded for the best pitcher on the market (Schilling) and tried to trade for the best player in baseball (A-Rod)! Do you really need to be a baseball genious to pull those off?
The whole "genius" thing is ridiculous. He signed/acquired some proven guys like Schilling, Foulke, and Mueller, then got good scouting reports/lucky with Ortiz, and INCREDIBLY lucky that after he traded Nomar the team got hot and won it all. If it wasn't for that, he'd have been run out of Boston by now. Look at the bad moves he's made. Getting rid of Lowe, Pedro, Nomar, and Damon. Signing Clement. I don't think he's a terrible GM, but he's not great either. He's about average, and certainly overrated.
Are you kidding? The Red Sox had Clement, Wakefield, Papelbon, Manny, Nixon, Varitek, DiNardo, Timlin, Foulke, Schilling, Ortiz, Crisp, Gonzalez, Pauley, Lester, Pena, and Wells miss a significant amount of time. So that's the starting outfield, the 4th outfielder, the 3 hitter/DH, the closer, 4/5 of the starting rotation, 3 different number 5 starters, the shortstop, the catcher, and the top 2 set up guys, many of them at or around the same time. The Yankees meanwhile lost Matsui, Sheffield, Mussina, and Cano. It's not even close to comparable.
Sorry, I only listed important players. I'm sure losing guys like Darrell Rasner hurt big time. Probably as much as the Sox losing Hee Seop Choi.
Mo being out for a month didn't hurt. Neither did Carl "I get paid to rest" Pavano. And definitely not Kyle "Damn my back is aching today" Farnsworth. Or even Randy "Jeezus I feel twice my age" Johnson. Yup, we were relatively free of injuries. The Sox had injury problems, but come on, the Yankees had their fair share too.
