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Therbobbyter: Let’s Take Your Temperature

Regarding Youk: was Bobby V.

a. trying to smooth things over when answering a baited question
b. trying to use mega mega-mind powers to schism the current reality
c. grooming Dustin Pedroia for a “C” jersey
d. outside his mind; don’t question GGOW
e. zzzzz

Regarding Bard: was Bobby V.

a. trying to get the best out of his new starter in a pressure situation
b. confident Bard wasn’t spent
c. confident the pen was a worse option, and Bard should be the ace reliever in his own start anyway
d. outside his mind; don’t sit on your ass and say you didn’t know he was through
e. zzzzz

It’s been a few days so the stew has had time to mellow. What’s your opinion of The Bobby V.? Please feel free to add your own F’n’Gs.

24 replies on “Therbobbyter: Let’s Take Your Temperature”

His Youk comment was hard to justify. At the very least he fumbled it pretty egregiously. It’s hard to believe he was unaware how much it would bother Youk or that he really was surprised when he found out Youk was bothered. Really? Pedroia’s reaction was also pretty blunt and put Bobby in his place about as much as I’ve seen a player put a manager in his place “not sure what he’s doing”, “maybe that works in Japan but not around here”, etc. Kind of a who’s coaching who moment.
In the end, I assume this stuff doesn’t make a big difference, other than to reinforce Bobby’s image as a talk-first-think-later buffoon.

I’d like to think there’s a method to the madness, combined with a few overpublicized missteps and a tad of bad judgment.
I’d like to think he’s playing the role of Norman Dale, breaking down the troops, figuring out what kind of hand he has.
But I just don’t know.
As Pete Abes pointed out, Valentine was hired to shake up the Red Sox because the Red Sox needed shaking up. So I guess it’s just gonna be kinda weird for a while. http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/extras/extra_bases/2012/04/the_prescient_w.html

Can’t even beat the fucking Twinkies anymore.
So by my calculations, once the Sox/Rags/Tigres are done with us, we’ll be about 8 games under .500.
No playoffs.
No hope.
No offense.
No pitching.
No happiness.
No #28.
The 80’s are here again.
I hate this team.
I’m going to kill myself.

Last year’s first 12: 2-10
This year’s first 12: 4-8
PROGRESS! *cries*
(To be fair, this was a tough road to hoe with Detroit, Toronto, TB, and Texas the start…and the Yankees on Friday…jeeeeez.)

I’m starting to think our teams are mirror images of each other – old and overrated.
I think Tito decided to go to Fenway because he’s realizing they did him a favor by firing him.

…except the last decade of early season matchup’s between our teams.
You guys ALWAYS crush us in the beginning of the season.
It really doesn’t matter anyway. Texas and Detroit are head and shoulders better than both our teams.

This weekend will be a battle of who can suck more. At least the Yankees are at .500.
I still don’t know what Valentine was thinking with the Youk comment. Did this team really need “shaking up”? Maybe, I don’t know. But I do know that Pedroia and Youk play harder and with more emotion than anyone else in baseball.

ARod and Tex are horrible.
Starting pitching is atrocious, aside from CSN. (Yes, that includes CC)
The bullpen is good but at this rate, they’ll be spent by the all-star break.
Unless Pettitte and Pineda come back STRONG, this team will miss the playoffs.
They disgust me.

Here’s something I wonder, kreug …
Will the press from both teams focus on the mirroring struggles of these teams this weekend or will the allow themselves to be distracted by the sideshows.

I have to think based on the last, I don’t know, 100 years that they will focus FULLY on the fact that the Sox and Yankees have become afterthoughts in the AL which is now clearly dominated by Texas and Detroit.
It is going to be a bloodbath.
But I won’t care because tomorrow is 4/20 so the gamer should be interesting.
:)
Girardi is showing himself to be a junk manager that relied on an all-star team with a $200 million payroll to win in SPITE of his bonehead decisions.
Valentine, well, don’t need to say anything else…
For us, fire Girardi after we miss the playoffs and pray that Mattingly will leave the Dodgers.

Yeah Ath. I don’t really agree with the attacks on Valentine for the Bard decision in a way. It’s early in the season, he’s getting to know his guys. He’s figuring out who – when they say “I’m fine” – really is fine vs. who is just always going to say that even if completely gassed. It’s April. I understand that as a fan one might be more upset about a decision that might have cost a game vs. one that just caused a ripple in the clubhouse and with the media, but my own view is that the Youk stuff is much harder to understand/justify. It’s not as if you need to know much about the Sox to know that Youkilis (and Pedroia) are incredibly committed and competitive. I’ve always viewed Youkilis as the Sox’s Paul O’Neill, getting probably as much as possible out of what physical capacity he has through intense focus, hard work, and motivation drawn from an extreme competitive streak. I just think Valentine’s comments regarding him were stupid and likely counterproductive.

It’s also nice that we play tonight in the Bronx, then the next day in Boston in the afternoon.
Ridiculous.
Automatic loss there after Hughes gets rocked again tonight.
So that will be 3 losses in a row and a 6-9 record. So best case scenario we come out of Boston 7-10.
Bet on it.

There are reasons not to worry about this early-season malaise.
First, Baltimore is bad, Toronto won’t sustain any success into the late summer and Tampa is offensively challenged.
Second, the Sox are really beat up. Let them get healthy. Get CCraw and Ells and Dice-K back, let Youk get healthy.
Third, Bobby heeds to figure out the bullpen, who is dependable and who is not, and who is best suited for what role. No one expected Melancon to suck and Bailey to get hurt. We never imagined that Aceves would be the closer. This will take time to iron out.
Fourth, this team needs an identity. It has shown signs of having an ability to come back.
Now, perhaps I’m delusional, and this is a precursor of things to come. But let’s cross that bridge when we get to it.
The Yankees … well, I won’t insult you guys. I’ve had too much going on to pay attention to what’s ailing them.
In the meantime, thank God I have the Bruins.

The Yanks weak-point has been their on-paper strength: starting pitching. Yeah the bats have been v bad with RISP, but really the main issue is that CC, Kiroda, Garcia, and Hughes have each had 2 weak-to-horrible starts apiece. And those weak starts have tended to be from the get-go, putting the offense in a hole and freeing the opposing pitcher to expand the zone by coughing up crooked numbers in the 1st inning. We’ll see if Hughes has anything tonight…

Whoa, tomorrow’s game is noon local time and the kid is in daycare for his one day a week (while I am unemployed)…
Krueg, you will officially have company (in more ways than one) on this fine 4/20…
;)

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