Bats Power Yankees To 9-4 Win Over The Sad, Sad Red Sox

How sad are the Boston Red Sox? Wow. They're 1-7, in last place, and currently have the worst record in all of baseball. I hope the Fenway Faithful take notice of that tomorrow at the ballpark when they see the standings on the Green Monster. The Red Sox, simply put, are terrible. Outside of Dustin Pedroia there isn't one person on that team that's doing much of anything.

As a team, through the 1st 7 games, they rank 29th out of 30th in team batting average, 27th out of 30th in OPS, and 21st out of 30th in runs scored. I remember having an exchange with a Sox fan on Twitter during the offseason. I had tweeted that the acquisitions of Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez provided a marginal offensive upgrade over Victor Martinez and Adrian Beltre. I was of course called an idiot or something. I wish I remembered who that Sox fan was so I could throw this at them but alas, their Twitter handle escapes me.

What even makes the team sadder is their pitching. They rank dead last in team ERA and OPS. They've allowed the most HRs and I don't think the stats I'm looking at include the 4 they gave up today. Outside of one start by Jon Lester they've all been horrendous. So much for having a team of 5 aces, eh Sox fans? The Red Sox, as the title of this post says, are a very sad, sad team. For now anyway. I don't expect them to stay this bad for the entire season. I think they're highly overrated, arguably the most overrated team ever, but they are a good club. They will win their fair share of games. But enough about them......

How about that game today? Awesome, right? Sure, the Yankees had a few sore spots, namely Ivan Nova, Brett Gardner, and Mark Teixeira, but by and large, great game. The story of the day was the offense. They hammered the Sox, scoring 9 times on 13 hits and 4 walks, and best of all, 4 HRs. The highlights pretty much came from the bottom of the order. The 5 thru 9 hitters combined to go 10-21 with 8 runs scored 9 RBI, 3 2B, 4 HR and 3 BB. They stole the show.

The 2 biggest scene stealers came from the very bottom of the order. Eric Chavez, making his first start as a Yankee, went 3-5 with 2 doubles. The big knocks though came off the bat of Russell Martin. Russell Russ went 2-4 with 2 HRs and 4 RBI. How big has Martin been this season? I am very, very impressed with what he's brought to the table. He now has 3 HRs on the year which is 2 less than the entire Red Sox team. Let me say that again. The Yankees catcher has 2 fewer HRs than the entire Red Sox team. Insert gut busting laughter here. If you were to put Martin on the Sox he'd be leading their team in longballs. The Red Sox. As previously mentioned, they're a sad, sad team.

The biggest negative from today's game had to be the start from Ivan Nova. As Yogi Berra would say, it's like deja vu all over again. What we saw today was reminiscent of the 2010 version of Ivan Nova. For those that can't remember that far back, in his seven 2010 starts Nova often struggled to make it through the 5th inning. He would be doing alright but then the wheels would fall off. His outing today kind of reminded me of that. He didn't have good stuff today. Lucky for him the Red Sox offense is terrible. If the Sox offense were any better the game could have finished much differently. Nova gave the Sox plenty of chances to score but the Sox just couldn't deliver. As a team the Sox went 1-17 with RISP. As I said they're a sad, sad team. Nova got away with one today in my book. He's got to be better. What he did today won't cut it.

Solid game by the bullpen. Glad to see David Robertson pick up the W on his birthday. D-Rob, Joba, and Luis Ayala combined for 4.2 scoreless IPs. Ayala was the only one of the trio to have a rough go of things. He allowed 3 hits and a walk. He struggled enough that the Yankees had to warm up both Rafael Soriano and Mariano Rivera. But Ayala got the outs when he needed to. Game over. Yankees win. Thuhh Yankees win.

We've got Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN tomorrow. CC vs. Josh Beckett. Yeah, I think we all know how this game is going to go. But hey, you never know. That's why they play the games, right. If they didn't the Red Sox would have already won the World Series and we wouldn't have any idea just how sad of a team they really are. Thankfully, we've gotten to see that. If you couldn't tell I'm absolutely loving it. But as I said up top I don't expect it to last. They've got a good squad and they'll win their share of games. I think it's clear though that they won't win as many as the Yankees. It's pretty evident who the better team is. As I tweeted this morning, Yankees > Red Sox. Always have been, always will be.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie