Saturday, May 31, 2014

The ridiculous numbers behind Xander Bogaerts' hot streak

Three days ago Xander Bogaerts was hitting .277.  Tonight he'll take the field with a .304 average, which ranks 12th in the American League.  He's got 9 hits in Boston's last three games, going 3-4, 3-5 and 3-5.

Bogaerts first started heating up two weeks ago.  After an 0-2 showing on May 16 vs. the Tigers left him batting .254, he's 23 for his last 53 (a .434 clip) over the Red Sox past 13 contests.  In that span Bogaerts is also slugging .660 with a .483 on-base percentage.  For the season his OBP now stands at .393, 4th best in the AL.

Bogaerts is 21 years old.  He's the youngest of roughly 400 AL players on Opening Day rosters.  "Exceptional plate discipline" and "youngest player in the league" is a scary combination.

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Friday, May 30, 2014

Friday twitter roundup: Bogaerts, Lackey hot; Canada hockey, Jenny Dell not. And a Wonder Years reunion

Yesterday the Red Sox started Ryan Lavarnway at first base, pinch hit for him with Daniel Nava, hit for Nava with David Ortiz, then ran for Ortiz with Mike Carp.


Meanwhile Jake Peavy pitched 8 innings, followed by Koji Uehara for the 9th.  It looks as if Uehara celebrated his victory with a nice cold beverage, although who knows what his postgame tweet actually means.


The suddenly hot Sox have won 4 straight after dropping their previous 10.


Jenny Dell is done at NESN.  I wonder what percentage of Red Sox Nation thinks Boston should have kept Dell and ditched Will Middlebrooks instead?



The New York Rangers eliminated the Montreal Canadiens last night, marking the 21st straight year that a Canadian team won't win the Stanley Cup, the longest such streak in NHL history.



And finally, there's no way I wasn't including this:




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Thursday, May 29, 2014

Poll suggests Americans hate Justin Bieber more than Aaron Hernandez

There's a story on ESPN.com right now about a poll which claims Donald Sterling is the most hated man in America.  According to the results, Sterling is disliked by 92% of the country.  Sterling topping the list seems perfectly normal at the moment, but I think ESPN missed the boat on the bigger issue here:

Annoying pop singer Justin Bieber ranked 5th with an 86% percent disapproval rating, ahead of alleged triple-murderer Aaron Hernandez at just 81% (since he definitely did it I feel stupid using the word alleged; and who knows if it's only three?).

I'm a little scared to find out what might be going on inside the heads of the 19% pro-Hernandez people.  Maybe they're the ones who bought this t-shirt.

One thing I'm sure we can all agree on, if the poll had been taken six weeks ago the clear winner would have been this guy:





RELATED: Aaron Hernandez should pay for this (literally)


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Wednesday, May 28, 2014

What's the deal with these athlete cutout bumper stickers?

While I was driving to the Cape last weekend, a car passed by on the highway that had a silver decal of a hockey player attached to the back.  It seemed a little unusual, but I didn't really think much of it...

Until less than a minute later, when the very next car I saw had a sticker in the same size, style and color, but this time of a girl's lacrosse player:



Has anybody else noticed these?  Do you know what the purpose of them is?  Is it something parents do now along the lines of those "My kid is an honor student at Podunk Middle School" bumper stickers, but instead it just signifies their offspring plays a certain sport?  If so, at least it's not as bad as "My child is a member of the No Cavity Club."

Or is this entire thing a complete coincidence, and I just happened to simultaneously come across two cars that have unexplainable and similarly weird stickers on them?


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Tuesday, May 27, 2014

What happened to the Clay Buchholz from a year ago?

I wish that ugly uniform was to blame...
Clay Buchholz just made his 10th start of the season yesterday.  It wasn't good, and most of his other trips to the mound so far haven't been either.  After allowing 6 earned runs (for the 4th time already this year) Buchholz's ERA now sits at 7.02, his WHIP at 1.98.  He's basically the polar opposite of what he was at this point last season, when he had a 1.73 ERA and a 1.05 WHIP.

Buchholz gave up 2 or fewer runs in 9 of his first 10 starts in 2013 (and on that one occasion it was still only 4).  This year he's surrendered 3 or more in 9 of 10 outings.

Last season Buchholz went at least 7 innings in each of his first 10 starts.  This year he's accomplished that feat only once, and it was exactly 7 innings at that.

The Red Sox went 9-1 when Buchholz pitched to this point last season, this year they are just 4-6.  That 5-game difference would improve their record from 21-29 to 26-24, and have Boston only 3 games out of 1st place.


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Monday, May 26, 2014

"Now there's a steal by Bird, underneath to DJ, he lays it in!"

Clay Buchholz just walked 8 guys in 3 innings, and the Red Sox are headed for their eleventh (I wrote the word out for added emphasis) straight loss.  For Boston fans in need of a little sports pick-me-up while celebrating Memorial Day, how about this: Today is the 27th anniversary of Larry Bird's iconic steal in Game 5 of the 1987 Eastern Conference Finals vs the Pistons.

There aren't very many sports play-by-play calls I actually remember word for word, but Johnny Most's description of this moment is one of them:





If this version doesn't give you chills, you're not a sports fan, plain and simple:





Personally I never though Dennis Johnson got enough credit for making that layup.  As far as layups go it was a pretty tough one, and under those circumstances it was mighty impressive.


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Sunday, May 25, 2014

Awesome Old Song of the Week: "Love Is on the Way" by Saigon Kick

Released in 1992, Love Is on the Way peaked at #12 on the Billboard pop charts.  It was the only hit Saigon Kick ever had; it's quite possible they were a little late to the party on the whole 80's-hair-band-rock-ballad thing.

To be honest I'm not ever really sure how awesome a song it was.  But I did have the cassette single, so at worst it must have at least been pretty good.

Regardless you have to love those colors/effects going on in the background of the video, I think I had a screen saver like that for my last desktop computer.





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