Season On Deck

The Phillies and the Red Sox played their On Deck Series this weekend, the final two games of their respective preseasons. Both games followed the same formula- Sox jump out to big lead against crappy Philly starting pitcher, Sox take out all of their starters by the 5th inning, Phillies come back in garbage time against the Sox scrubs to make the final score look respectable. As a Phillie fan AND as a Sox fan, I didn't really see too much value in playing these games. Both teams might have been better served if they hadn't been played. They could have relaxed, maybe played a little golf, hunted some ducks, did some sudoku- there were plenty of available alternatives. Of course the sudoku option may not have provided the 2 organizations with quite as much revenue.

There were some individual performances worthy of note. In Game 1, Cole Hamels and his 86 MPH heater allowed 5 ER on 6 hits in 5 IP. Four of the 6 hits were HRs. Hamels has allowed 9 HR in 20 Spring innings, which is bad. Gavin Floyd bad. Hopefully, when the games are for reals, he will get his act together. He at least needs to throw with more velocity than Garcia and Moyer.

In Game 2, Adam Eaton allowed 6 ER on 8 hits in 3 IP. His Spring ERA was 7.91. I can't believe the Phillies will be paying this guy $24.5 mil over three years. I'm not certain he is worth 24.5 CENTS over 3 years. They'll be lucky if he posts an ERA under 5. With his terrible injury history, it doesn't look like he'll be an innings eater, either. I'm just not very optimistic about Eaton right now.

The Red Sox had mostly promising performances. However, Matsuzaka's Saturday appearance wasn't exactly good. He pitched 4 innings, allowing 3 runs on only 2 hits (1 hit was a 2 run HR by Pat Burrell) and 4 (!) walks. Seven of his 12 outs were K's. Perhaps he was experimenting with pitching with runners on base. You know, in case any of his perfect games are marred by error(s) by the Sox defenders. But as a Sox fan, and a Daisuke fantasy baseball owner, I expect more from the 12 Million Yen Man.

Batshit Crazy Tavarez pitched effectively on Friday night, allowing only 1 ER on 6 hits over 5 2/3 innings. He is not scheduled to start again until April 7th, which gives him plenty of time spring Ugueth Urbina from jail.

Dustin Pedroia did some very un-Pedroia like stuff this weekend, making with the RBIs and even hitting a HR! He even managed to get his Spring OPS up to .651. Which is lower than Bobby Scales' OPS. Not good. The Sox need a real, live 2B.

Jason Varitek showed some life Saturday, hitting a HR to raise his Spring OPS to .555. Which is less than Dustin Pedroia. Real bad. It is never a good sign if Dustin Pedroia has a better offensive stat than you. But Jason might be getting his act together, starting with his 1 for 2 effort Saturday. This was probably the impetus behind Jason's turnaround.

Both teams have long seasons ahead of them ,but I'm hoping for a quick start by each. Preferably .700 ball in April, with at least a 10 game lead over the 2nd place team from New York. Less than 2 days until the games count...