Although my health is still precarious, Dan's latest diatribe forces me to recount his May missives.
Since the beginning of the month the Shankster has penned twelve columns, most of which were relatively free of Shanksterisms, although a number of comments from several blog boys und girls found fault with some of Danny Boy's smarmy smears.
Of his twelves efforts, six involved the Celtics, three were centered on the Bruins, and three were aimed at the Red Sox. Surprisingly, when the Celtics were humiliated by the Orlando Magic the other night Shank did not aim his poison pen at the men in green.
But he made up for his lack of comments regarding the C's no showing of the other evening with his column concerning David Ortiz, a/k/a Big Papi, in Wednesday's Globe.
Entitled "No. 1 Problem Is in No. 3 Spot," Shaughnessy laments the fact that both the Celtics and the B's have been eliminated from their respective playoffs because their continued presence deflected attention from Big Papi's woeful performance at the plate thus far this season. He finds fault with the fact that Ortiz has been tight-lipped of late with the media. Yet Shank goes on to quote Sox manager Terry Francona as saying that Ortiz is tired of answering the same questions.
Duh!
Dan predicts that Papi is singelhandedly poised to sink the Sox. Yet methinks the starting pitching is actually more critical to righting Boston's ship, especially with the imminent return of Kevin Youkilis. And I'll bet Tito juggles the line-up and moves Jason Bay & Co. and drops Ortiz's spot in the batting order until (if) he reacquires his prowess at the plate.
This seems to be another one of Shank's patented rushes to judgement. But the jury's still out...
4 comments:
Glad to read you're well enough to write a little. Keep well.
Well, I think we can agree that Shanks comment is a bit over the top.
"This is bad. This is embarrassing. David Ortiz is only 33 years old, but he looks like he is finished, and if he remains in the No. 3 spot in Sox batting order, he could take the team down."
But, I think for once he is reflecting the concern for the "Fan Boys" out there who very concerned with Ortiz's slump.
It is now May 20th and Ortiz looks terrible at the plate ... I think it is time for him to swallow a little pride and ask terry to move him down in the lineup. Barring that, Terry must make the tough move for the good of the team.
Red Sox 8 Blue Jays 3. Papi hits a mammoth homerun to centerfield.
Let's see if Shank eats his words now. By the way, he also predicted 'Tek was through...
On a personal note, I had to get a defibrillator implanted May 8th on short notice and have had some complications. The site is swollen and extremely painful. That said, I'll try to get back into the swing of things and keep the blog update in a timely manner.
Absolutely. 100 percent dead-on.
True. It is a rush to judgment to be concerned over the impact of a number 3 hitter languishing barely north of the Mendoza line, running to the cusp of Memorial Day weekend without a home run and turning in an embarassing outing against the division leaders. It's just the trials and tribulations of good old time baseball. It's good that Big Papi shows signs of having lost the ability to get around on a fastball. It's real good that he's performing like that. So let's wish Shaughnessy and everyone who has bad thoughts into the cornfield.
Now if you'll excuse me, my pink hat needs to be laundered.
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