The Playoff Race

Shank does a column on another Red Sox late inning win:

It’s finally September and the Red Sox, with their dramatic comebacks and overachieving no-names, are still winning

Days of miracle and wonder.

Imagine what this must be like for incoming college freshmen on Park Drive, Bay State Road, and Commonwealth Avenue. It’s your first night in Boston and the evening’s periodically interrupted by joyous noise and pulsating lights from inside the ancient, hardball theater across the street from the Cask ‘n Flagon.

The Red Sox did it again Monday at Fenway Park. Winning a game that featured three lead changes and runs scored in every inning except the fourth, they rebounded from a three-run deficit in the eighth and bested the Mariners, 9-8, in the 10th when Trevor Story — playing his first Fenway game since May 14 — cracked a gapper to left-center with the bases loaded and one out.

“I’ve been watching the boys do it all year,” Story said. “It inspires me. These guys have done some great work. It’s what this team has been doing all year and I’m proud to be part of it.”

DHL Dan CCCV - Tripping

Well, if Shank can take a few weeks off, why can't I?

Shank's last column tries to hit on unfamiliar ground:

Watching the Red Sox from the front row of baseball’s alternate universe has been quite the trip, and other thoughts

A baby boomer who came of age in the counterculture late 1960s, I missed America’s troubling recreational teen drug scene. No psychedelics for me. Not even a toke of weed. I was always afraid Groton police chief Mayo Darling would burst through the door of my dorm room.

So now I wonder if watching the 2026 Red Sox is giving my aging peers flashbacks to their post-Woodstock, hallucinogenic experiences of more than a half-century ago? Is this what that was like? Profound sensory distortion? An altered cognitive state?

Seriously, folks. Since the end of June, Sox fans have shared box seats in the front row of baseball’s alternate universe. Go ask Alex (Speier). Up is down and down is up. Caleb Durbin is Wade Boggs and Ceddanne Rafaela is Reggie Smith. The team that couldn’t win is the team that can’t lose. With apologies to Grace Slick, the man on the chessboard is telling us where to go. White Knight Tom Caron is talking backward, and logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead. Once 14 games under .500 and 15½ games behind the Yankees, the Red Sox enter Sunday within 1½ games of the Yanks and look like a sure playoff team.

DHL Dan CCCII - Rooting For A Shitcanning

In this week's Picked Up Pieces column, Shank wonders about the employment status of Craing Breslow:

Maybe the Red Sox should replace Craig Breslow, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while debating whether to watch Haiti-Scotland World Cup or Knicks-Spurs Game 5 Saturday night . . .

⋅ Hall of Fame manager Earl Weaver rarely held “team meetings” when the Orioles were struggling.

“Why would I have a meeting if we’re going bad?” Weaver reasoned. “Suppose we have a big meeting then go out and lose the next game. What do I do then?”

This is where the Red Sox find themselves as they lurch into the middle third of their sorry season. Fenway Sports Group and Craig Breslow nuked face-of-the-franchise manager Alex Cora and six of his coaches after merely 27 games of the 2026 season. Now that the Red Sox look even worse, it’s bad optics to fire chief baseball officer Breslow, even though it’s fairly obvious he’s a huge part of the problem.

Asked Thursday about the possibility of replacing Breslow, Red Sox president and CEO Sam Kennedy told WEEI, “It’s not even on the table.” Swell. But it should be on the table.

If part of your earlier response was to fire Alex Cora and most of his staff, then maybe you should consider Breslow as well. That would depend on what direction ownership truly wants - to win or to maximize profits.

DHL Dan CCCI - Talk Of The Town

First off - that's the title of a very nice song from The Pretenders.

Now, onto Shank's weekly Picked Up Pieces column! The Boston Red Sox have been doing terrible this year, currently mired in last place in the American League East and shipping former starting pitcher Brayan Bello to Worcester after crapping out in his last start yesterday. On sports talk radio, the sorry state of the team has been fodder for weeks, yet Shank says...

In this sad Red Sox spring of 2026, they’re no longer the talk of the town, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while waiting for Mickey Gasper to sign a multiyear deal with W.B. Mason . . .

My morning routine takes me on a slow neighborhood jog and I regularly cross paths with a couple of sports fans who’ll often comment on the latest events involving our local teams.

“How about those Sox?” I teased as I shuffled past the guys this past week.

“We don’t talk about them anymore,” said one of them. “We just talk about A.J. Brown.”

Bingo. Such is the tone of most sports conversation in this sad Sox spring of 2026.

It’s early June and the Sox are the only game in town, but they’re largely ignored on local sports airwaves. If you visit a Hub saloon, the TV over the bar will probably feature golf, the Knicks, Roland Garros, or Stephen A. Smith ripping Jaylen Brown.

That last bolded part is 1,000 percent pure, unadulterated bullshit. Check out any podcast from 98.5 The Sports Hub in recent weeks for this demonstrably false assertion / statement.

DHL Dan CCXCIX - Interim Managers

Interim Red Sox managers isn't a new thing. Shank called up Walpole Joe and got his take on the new guy:

Joe Morgan, the greatest interim manager in baseball history, knows what Chad Tracy is dealing with, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while waiting for the Super Bowl rematch when the Patriots visit Seattle Sept. 9 …

⋅ With the 2026 Red Sox wrapping their third week under “interim” manager Chad Tracy, it’s time to hear from the greatest interim manager in baseball history, Walpole’s Joe Morgan.

“What the hell happened to [Alex] Cora and all those coaches?” Morgan asked when I reached him at his home this past week. “Boston is tough, isn’t it?”

Not for Joe Morgan, it wasn’t.

Pull up a chair and listen, young’uns: Way back in 1988, the star-studded, underachieving Red Sox fired crusty skipper John McNamara July 14, and named Morgan — who’d been their Triple-A manager for nine seasons — interim manager.

Morgan’s Red Sox ripped off 12 straight wins, and 19 of 20, climbing from nine games out of first to one game back in three torrid weeks. Morgan shed “interim” six days into the surge and signed a contract extension through 1989 just three weeks after taking over.

DHL Dan CCXCVII - Q & A Session

Speaking for 'the fans', a favorite / classic tactic for passive aggressiveness, Shank airs out 'fan' grievances like it was Festivus:

Red Sox fans have more questions than answers about their last-place team, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces in the aftermath of last weekend’s “Knives Out” Red Sox blockbuster …

⋅ The Sox on Friday returned to Fenway for a weekend series with the Astros after an unforgettable 3-3 road trip that further damaged one of baseball’s great brands. They started May in last place with a new manager, a raft of new coaches, and a 12-19 record, eight games behind the Yankees.

Boston fans have more questions than answers in the wake of the Saturday night massacre that took down Alex Cora and six of his coaches.

Let’s start with third-year president of baseball operations Craig Breslow. Exactly what has Breslow done to earn his status as King of the Red Sox? Team CEO Sam Kennedy says the axing of Cora and six coaches was entirely Breslow’s call, a decision that Kennedy says ownership “fully supported.”

“He wanted to fire everybody who was here before he got here,” a source told The Athletic.

Breslow's status is Chief Penny Pincher for the Red Sox; just think 'sports and spreadsheets'.

Shitcanned

Alex Cora's reign as Red Sox manager is over, and Shank's not entirely happy about it:

It wasn’t Alex Cora’s fault the Red Sox roster stinks, and he shouldn’t have been fired over it

There you go.

The Saturday Night Massacre.

Settling All Family Business.

Officially speaking, the Red Sox are a clown show. They are the Chuck Sullivan-Clive Rush Boston Patriots. They are the San Diego Clippers under Donald Sterling. They are the 21st-century New York Jets.

Where to start?

The Sox fired pretty much everybody last night while the team was in Baltimore, basking in the afterglow of a 17-1 victory over the Orioles — sort of like that dark day in ’65 when they fired their GM on the day that young Dave Morehead pitched a no-hitter. It turns out that Fenway fans chanting, “Sell the team,” and a 10-17 start were too much for owner John Henry and president of baseball ops Craig Breslow to bear.

He was fied in large part because his heart was no longer into the job.

DHL Dan CCXCVI - Eraser

Shank spots what seems to be a Trotsky-esque revision of the past by eliminating one of its participants:

Why does it seem like the Red Sox are trying to erase Larry Lucchino from franchise lore, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while wondering if 76er Paul George has met American sci-fi author John Ringo . . .

⋅ What’s up with Fenway Sports Group’s not-so-subtle campaign to erase Larry Lucchino?

Lucchino, who died in the spring of 2024, had enormous impact on FSG’s Red Sox success for 14 seasons but is hard to find in a new team statement and video celebrating “25 seasons of stewardship” since John Henry’s group purchased the ball club in 2002.

Those of us who were there from 2002-15 remember how the “new” owners presented themselves as a united trio: Henry, TV magnate Tom Werner, and Lucchino, a visionary ballpark builder who came into baseball with the Orioles under Edward Bennett Williams in 1979.

It was always “John, Tom, and Larry.” After Theo Epstein came on board as boy wonder general manager, they were “Theo and the trio.”

Four months after Lucchino died, Henry said, “The three of us had one of the greatest rides in sports history . . . He [Lucchino] was as much a part of Red Sox history as any part of the organization.”

And yet it’s hard to find his place in team history when one views FSG’s silver anniversary celebration.

Opening Day

I went to one Red Sox home opener. It was in the late 1980's, bleacher seats and I was there with someone from school. We get to the sixth inning and a guy about three rows in front of us gets up and drops trou. She shrieked; I'm like 'full moon, baby!'

That sort of thing doesn't happen nowadays, but after an awful first set of games, the Red Sox kicked off the start of the home games on the right foot:

A new season at Fenway, as it always does, conjures up the memories

Booed yesterday. Cheered today.

You’re never as good as you look when you win or as bad as you look when you lose. The only certainty in the Boston Baseball Experience is that in one form or another, it’s always about the past.

You can embrace 2026 with its robotic umps, player empowerment, in-game celebrations, and starting pitchers who get a parade if they last six innings.

But at the end of every Fenway opener, it’s winning or losing and how a particular game compares with stuff that happened 20, 40, maybe 100 years ago in this same sacred space.

The last-place Red Sox — tied for worst record in baseball with the lowly A’s and ChiSox at the start of the day — defeated the Padres, 5-2, at Fenway Park in the 126th home opener for the team originally known at the Boston Americans.

DHL Dan CCXCII - Mild Criticism

You figure if a team plays bad, Shank's all over them, right? Last week's Picked Up Pieces column, leading off with the Sox's Game 2 loss to the Cincinnatti Reds, doesn't throw much of a punch:

Red Sox’ run prevention looks a lot like 2025 in the early going, and other thoughts

CINCINNATI ― Picked up pieces from four days on the road with the Red Sox . . .

Saturday’s 11-inning, 6-5 loss to the Reds in front of 38,298 at Great American Ball Park was one of the most entertaining Game 2’s in baseball history.

Exaggeration? Of course. But who’s going to argue? There’ve been a lot of memorable Opening Days, but Game 2’s generally dissolve into the ether as emphatically forgettable. Just one of 162.

Not this one. The Sox were sloppy early as Sonny Gray struggled in his Sox debut. Boston trailed, 5-3, in the late innings, but were lifted by Wilyer Abreu (do they have a better hitter than this guy?), who roped an RBI double to cut it to 5-4 in the seventh, then hit a two-out, ninth- inning homer off flamethrower Emilio Pagán to send the game into extras.

The Reds won it in the 11th when Dane Myers singled home TJ Friedl on an 0-1 pitch from Justin Slaten.

Speaking of flamethrowing, I wonder when Shank's going to torch the team again? Stay tuned!

Red Sox Roundup

Shank's done a lot of columns about the 2025 Boston Red Sox over the last couple of weeks and I havent, so let's get all caught up!

With this column, Shank straddles the fence on a good but possibly flawed team, followed up by saying nice things abuth their opening day win.

DHL Dan CCLXXXVIII - PR Gone Wrong

In this week's Picked Up Pieces column, Shank milks the foot in mouth Red Sox theme a little more:

It’s clear Red Sox management still needs to work on its messaging, and other thoughts

FORT MYERS, Fla. — Picked-up pieces while waiting for Celtics at Lakers, TV tipoff 6:30 on NBC Sunday night . . .

⋅ Red Sox (and Globe) owner John Henry chooses not to take questions from media or fans anymore. It’s been six years since the owner last engaged in a full-blown media session (after the Mookie Betts debacle), and he kept his streak alive this past week when he made his annual appearance at the team’s organizational meeting to kick off the first full-squad workout at spring training.

In his stead, the Red Sox rolled out CEO/president/mouthpiece Sam Kennedy, who took questions for a half-hour while Sox chairman Tom Werner had a rare sitdown with the Globe’s Peter Abraham.

After all the words were spoken, we were more confused than ever. Within 24 hours, Kennedy was on NESN, furiously backpedaling on his unfortunate, “If Alex Bregman wanted to be here, ultimately he’d be here” fireball, while Rafael Devers was being asked to respond to Werner’s “just pick up a glove” broadside.

Makes You Wonder Why He's Here, Then

Shank's on his annual semi-vacation known as Red Sox spring training, Shank talks to Aroldis Chapman, bullpen ace:

Catching up with Red Sox fireballer Aroldis Chapman, who’s dreaming of a third World Series ring

FORT MYERS, Fla., — Speed thrills.

Every kid who picks up a baseball wants to throw hard. It’s a measure from the first time we step on a baseball diamond. Throw hard. Make ‘em swing and miss. Sit down, chump. Who’ll be next to try to catch up to the heat?

There’s a reason everybody lines up for the radar gun underneath the stands at ballparks around the world. Kids want to impress each other. Young men show off for their girlfriends, maybe ripping a rotator cuff trying to crack 76 miles per hour on the speed detector.

Your Boston Red Sox have the world record-holder, the Gas God from the Altar of Speed: lefty reliever Aroldis Chapman.

It’s all relative of course. There was no measure for the the fastballs of Walter Johnson, Bob Feller, or Nolan Ryan, but since there’s been reliable calibration, Chapman is the fastest of all. In September of 2010, he threw a pitch in a big league game that was clocked at 105.8 miles per hour.

...

Acknowledging that the 2025 season was the season of his career, Chapman’s says he going for a third World Series ring in ’26.

“That’s the goal that this organization has and that’s my goal,’’ he said.

Does anybody really believe this is the goal of the Red Sox front office? They lowballed Alex Bregman, who signed with the Cubs because they offered him more money than the Red Sox, and yesterday Sam Kennedy preposterously claimed that “If Alex Bregman wanted to be here,” Kennedy said, “ultimately he’d be here.” You can't have it both ways, Mr. Kennedy, and the notion this is a World Series contender when they can't be bothered to land key players is laughable.

DHL Dan CCLXXIII - Looking Back

With the Boston Red Sox no longer in the playoffs, Shank looks back a half century:

Why are we still looking back at the 1975 World Series 50 years later? Because it’s who we are, and other thoughts.

Picked-up pieces while blissfully remembering what life was like when the World Series was here 50 years ago this weekend . . .

⋅ A half-century later, the October 1975 and 2025 calendars align perfectly.

Game 4 in Cincinnati was Wednesday, Oct. 15. That’s when Luis Tiant whirled and twirled for 163 pitches and went the distance in a 5-4 series-squaring victory. The Reds’ Game 5 win was Thursday, Oct. 16. Then everybody flew back to Boston for Game 6 on Saturday.

In October 1975, Kevin Paul Dupont and I were 22 years old, covering high school football for the Globe for the princely sum of $35 per game. Through the kindness of veteran Associated Press sports editor Dave O’Hara, we also were quote-runners at Red Sox games at Fenway Park ($7 per game), which is how we happened to be at the Park Plaza for the food-and-booze World Series hospitality feast on Friday, Oct. 17, the eve of Game 6 — originally scheduled as Bill Lee vs. Jack Billingham. There was a threat of rain all weekend.

While inhaling our free Lobster Newburg, we learned that the Globe was looking for Peter Gammons’s World Series notebook. Nobody on Morrissey Boulevard could find Gammons and we were tasked with cobbling together some notes for the next morning’s paper.

DHL Dan CCLXXI - Second Guessing, Shank's Favorite Pastime

In this weeks Picked Up Pieces column, Shank plays the what if? card with the Red Sox:

Rafael Devers might have been the piece the Red Sox were lacking in the playoffs, and other thoughts

Picked up pieces while predicting a big Patriot win Sunday night in Buffalo …

A fun Red Sox season is over. The locals made it to the postseason for the first time since 2021, then flamed out in a best-of-three Wild Card Series vs. the hated Yankees. The Sox were staggering at the finish, with only one-and-a-half starting pitchers, the worst defense in baseball, a lot of injured players, and a Charmin-soft lineup peppered with guys who’ve been cut loose by other teams and picked up from the recycling bin.

Seriously. How far were you going to go with Rob Refsnyder batting leadoff and Romy Gonzalez hitting cleanup against a Yankees team that featured four former MVPs in the first four spots in the lineup?

I will leave it to the Globe’s super-smart baseball scribes to speculate on what should be a busy winter for Boston baseball boss Craig Breslow and the Sox owners.

But for one final time, please let me address the myth of the Rafael Devers trade/salary dump that has been credited with turning around the Boston season, but, in fact, ultimately sunk the team in its final days.

The Red Sox batted .198 with one homer in the playoffs. Gonzalez, Refsnyder, Jarren Duran, Ceddanne Rafaela, Wilyer Abreu, Nathaniel Lowe, and Carlos Narváez combined to hit .054 (3 for 55).

Predicting a big Patriot win tomorrow night, is he? Here's another prediction - if the Patriots lose to Buffalo, Shank will be all over their case on Monday and he'll somehow blame Robert Kraft for it.

Belated Red Sox Playoff Wrap-Up

I didn't spot these columns 'til late in the week, so I'll mention them briefly.

Shank's first column celebrates the grand tradition of the Red Sox / Yankees playoff baseball. He loved Garrett Crochet's pitching in Game 1 of the series, and then things came crashing down in Game 2 when the Yankees tied the series up. In the end, the Yankees were the better team, who now go on to play the Toronto Blue Jays in the next round.

I'm left wondering one thing - would the series have turned out better for the Red Sox if we could've played just one freaking game at Fenway Park?

Back On The Bandwagon?

With the Boston Red Sox now in the playoffs, their opponet is their traditional rival, the New York Yankees. After shitting on the Red Sox and their ownership team for a majority of the past four years this season, Shank's now back at the front of the bandwagon:

Red Sox-Yankees in the playoffs. Does it get any better than this?

It’s just too good.

The Red Sox are in the playoffs Tuesday for the first time in four years, only the second time since they won the World Series in 2018 . . . and they are playing a best-of-three against the New York Yankees.

Red Sox-Yankees. Again.

Do we need to educate the young’uns and remind everyone what this means?

Red Sox-Yankees is an all-timer. It’s Harvard vs. Yale, Kennedy vs. Nixon, Athens vs. Sparta.

It’s Ohio State-Michigan, Army-Navy, Trump-Comey.

It is the ultimate American sports rivalry and we are getting it in the first round of baseball’s ever-expanding playoffs.

Strap yourselves in for two (possibly three) nights of hard-ball history and histrionics. This could be great. Enjoy the ride.

It's a good column by Shank, but I wonder - if Aaron Judge finally snaps out of his postseason slumps (and it's not pretty), do they win this series?

DHL Dan CCLXX - The Baseball Playoff Column

After the Boston Red Sox wrapped up a playoff slot this season (that next to nobody was able to watch because John Henry wants to nickle and dime us to death by putting these Friday games on Apple+), Shank takes a look at recent (non) Red Sox playoff runs:

Why not the Red Sox this October, and other thoughts ahead of the baseball playoffs

Picked up pieces while waiting for the baseball playoffs to begin . . .

Time to exhale, Red Sox Nation. The Sox are going to the playoffs again. Finally. The Alex Cora Athletic Club (ACAC?) made it official late Friday at Fenway, coming from behind to beat the Tigers, 4-3, in a pulsating walkoff win — probably Boston’s best baseball game since 2021.

Time to dig out that Instagram photo of Red Sox principal owner John Henry, who also owns the Globe, sitting in front of his fireplace smoking a stogie after signing free agent Alex Bregman in February. It’s Auerbach-esque, providing a hazy whiff of winning ways that marked Fenway Sports Group in its first 18 summers (2002-2019) of ownership.

Those “so-good, so-good” championship campaigns went away in recent years as the big-market Sox pivoted toward baseball’s big middle, finishing last three times after firing Dave Dombrowski and trading/salary-dumping Mookie Betts. Chaim Bloom was hired and fired, and Henry and Co. were booed at a mid-winter fan event. There was one outlier season in 2021 — 92 wins and an appearance in the ALCS — but it never felt like the good old days.

It’s better now.

It's better for now...

DHL Dan CCLXIX - Nail Biter

In this week's Picked Up Pieces column, Shank's happy that the Red Sox are in the playoff hunt:

Thanks to the Red Sox’ nailbiter of a playoff chase, this is our best September in a while, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while checking last night’s baseball scores every morning . . .

⋅ It’s our best September in a while. The weather’s been spectacular and those of us who consider daily box scores one of the major food groups search for results as soon as we get out of bed.

Are the Sox actually going to blow this thing? How’d the Yankees do last night? Will Houston or Seattle win the AL West? Are the billion-dollar Mets going off a cliff? Could Rafael Devers and the Giants actually make it to the postseason?

This isn’t a real pennant race like the Red Sox gave us in the pre-wild-card days, but Rob Manfred’s contrived, inclusive playoff system is working for me in 2025. Today, I’m officially thanking Sox owners for finally making good on their annual offseason pledge to play “meaningful games” in late September and October. It’s been too long and we’ve tolerated too many phony NESN moments hyping the illusion of contention when we knew the Sox had no chance to qualify for MLB’s annual October bakeoff.

This fall is different. The ’25 Red Sox are the proverbial little girl with the curl. When they are good they are very good, and when they are bad they are horrid.

So, no 'illusion of contention' this year, Shank?

DHL Dan CCLXIII - Standing Pat

In this week's Picked Up Pieces column, Shank's all over the Red Sox for doing jack shit at the trading deadline:

The Red Sox’ trade deadline inaction speaks louder than words, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while watching the Red Sox tread water at the trade deadline again . . .

⋅ The Sox treat loyal fans like chumps. They take them for granted. They continue to gaslight Red Sox Nation, making pledges about playing meaningful games in September and October, but deep down they value payroll flexibility and controllable contracts over winning the World Series.

This is the way it’s been since 2018, and nothing changed Thursday when the Sox had a chance to go all-in to support an interesting and exciting team that has put itself in position to make a serious playoff run.

Fans make an emotional investment in this team, but management doesn’t reciprocate. It’s been this way for 6½ seasons and it could not be more obvious. Actions speak louder than words. The Sox talk full throttle, then remain stalled in neutral.

Apologists and folks who’ve stopped paying attention cite “four World Series in this century,” enabling Boston ownership to perpetuate this farce.