Baltimore 9, Boston 3

The Orioles blew out the Red Sox again last night. In 4 of the 5 Fenway games between the two teams played thus far, the Orioles have scored at least 8 runs, averaging 9. Wakefield was, again, awful. They did nothing against Ponson until the 7th. They swung early, didn't work the count. Just a very bad performance all around.

• The Red Sox are a dominant offensive team. Their 281 runs scored trails only Texas in all of Major League baseball. A 3-run deficit in the 2nd inning at Fenway Park should not be considered insurmountable. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
  
  But that's what it felt like when Gil's ball settled into the monster seats in the 2nd inning. It felt like the game was over. And why is that?
  
  Because the Red Sox haven't come back against anyone this year. They've played 52 games, and the largest deficit that they've overcome, twice, was 3 runs. They tied a game that they had trailed by 3 on April 22 in Tampa Bay, and they took a lead in a game that they had trailed by 3 on May 13 in Seattle. In both cases, they lost the game. The largest deficit that they've overcome to actually win a game is 2, and they've done that only 4 times. The Red Sox opponents have scored first in 25 of their 52 games, and they've lost 16 of them. They've lost games in which they had leads of 4 and 5 runs, but they've yet to win a game in which they trailed by more than 2.
  
  Actually, for a team with an offense as good as their offense is, they've been awful when the opponents score much. They're 0-11 when the opposition scores 8 or more (not that you expect to win often when you allow more than 7 runs, but occasionally a team with an offense this good ought to be able to overcome a poor pitching performance), and a shocking 1-18 when they allow more than 5 runs. They've won 1 of the 3 games in which they allowed 7 runs and none of the 5 in which they allowed 6. This team should be able to win more than 12.5% of the games in which they allow 6 or 7 runs.



• I knew it before I turned the radio on this morning. I knew it as soon as Manny's hit in the 7th reached the outfield. "Francona's an idiot!" "Francona cost them the game!" "Francona gave up!"
  
  After the 6th inning ended last night with Jason Varitek grounding out, Francona replaced Varitek with Kelly Shoppach. They have a day game today, following last night's game, and the score was 7-0 at the time. The logic is clearly that they wanted to play Varitek today, the odds of winning that game were very small, and they would be better off letting Varitek have the last 3 innings off and play today.
  
  I don't have any problem with that whatsoever. The fact that Shoppach did in fact reach the plate as the tying run in the 7th is irrelevant. The game wasn't definitely lost because he was hitting in the 7th, it wouldn't have been definitely won had Varitek (0-3 on the night, 0-9 in the series) still been in the game. The odds of winning that game were degraded by the removal of Varitek, but they were degraded by a really small amount. A team trailing 7-0 after 6 is going to lose 99% of those games no matter who's in the lineup. If Terry thought it would benefit the team today to have Varitek not catch the last 3 innings last night, then he did absolutely the right thing, and the second-guessing this morning is the kind of second-guessing that merits nothing but contempt.



• One of my favorite statistics quotes is from Branch Rickey in 1954:
  

  After giving it a thorough trial we found there was still no place for RBIs in the formula. As a statistic, RBIs were not only misleading but dishonest. They depended on managerial control, a hitter's position in the batting order, park dimensions and the success of his teammates in getting on base ahead of him

  
  
  I don't like RBI as a statistic, for the reasons that Rickey says here, and for other reasons. One of which is illustrated perfectly in last night's 7th inning. Trailing 7-0, the Red Sox loaded the bases with no outs. Up to the plate strides Johnny Damon. First pitch, he drives to left field, where it's caught. Kevin Millar tags and scores from third. Johnny Damon gets an RBI, and not an at-bat, so his batting average doesn't drop.
  
  And he absolutely hurt the team. That runner scoring from 3rd is virtually irrelevant. They needed 7 runs to tie, which means that they needed baserunners. A double-play ball would have hurt the team more than Damon did, but that's the only thing that would have. The team needed hitters to not make outs. Enough people not making outs, and that run will score, one way or another.
  
  I'm not criticizing Damon here. He was looking for a pitch to drive, he might have hit the best pitch he was going to get, and he nearly hit it onto the wall, which would have been a very good thing. I'm criticizing a statistic that says that Damon helped the team in that at-bat. He did not.