I was afraid of flying until a pilot with whom I grew up set me straight. A plane wants to stay in the air, he said, comfortingly. A plane’s wing can bend at nearly a 90 degree angle and not snap, he said, less comfortingly. A plane will only crash when a thousand things go […]
about 17 hours ago | 0 reads
Certain segments of American baseball fans and the American baseball establishment are struggling to accept an increasingly obvious reality: The World Baseball Classic matters a lot, even if it doesn’t matter all that much to them. Prior to last night’s championship clash between the USA and Venezuela, Derek Jeter, who played in the first iteration […]
about 20 hours ago | 0 reads
What’s This Team’s Deal? Last year, this article began with a picture of a completely disheveled Tropicana Field, still unusable six months after Hurricane Milton. After sustaining significant water and wind damage, the stadium has been renovated and the Rays will return to Tropicana Field in less than a month. The capacity of this renovated […]
about 23 hours ago | 0 reads
The WBC has arrived. It probably arrived in 2023, to be honest — that Shohei-Trout at-bat feels like one of the most significant baseball moments of this century. But this is year that the WBC has broken containment. This is the year that the non-baseball watching people in my life are asking me about it. […]
1 day ago | 1 read
Is the game on TV? It is. First pitch at 1:05 PM on NESN. What’s the lineup What should we watch for? Happy green Red Sox jersey day! Honestly, that’s always kind of a fun thing to watch, though I wonder if the new City Connects will dilute the novelty a bit. As for actual […]
2 days ago | 0 reads
MIAMI, FL — When I decided to plan a trip to Miami centered around the knockout stage of the World Baseball Classic a few weeks ago, I did so with the expectation that the tournament would see a steady rise in popularity over the next couple of decades. In a world where almost everything is […]
2 days ago | 0 reads
Hello and happy Tuesday, folks. Happy World Baseball Classic title game day, too! Team USA will be going for their second WBC title in Miami this evening, while Venezuela is trying to become the fourth nation to win the tournament. It’s the culmination of what’s been a fantastic few days of baseball (well not if […]
2 days ago | 1 read
The World Baseball Classic has matured to the point where, like the World Cup and NCAA tournament, each edition is going to be remembered for a specific storyline. In 2023, that storyline was the ascension of Shohei Ohtani to the level of Global Sports God. Over those two-and-a-half weeks we saw him definitively swipe the […]
3 days ago | 0 reads
As the Red Sox approach Opening Day, it’s time to start taking at look at the other American League playoff contenders. Next up, a team that may still be recovering from baseball heartbreak. What’s this team’s deal? The Toronto Blue Jays were inches away. Minutes away. One play or bounce away. They took the Los […]
3 days ago | 2 reads
Is it on TV? Yes, first pitch at 1:05 PM on NESN. What’s the lineup? What should we watch for? It’s always fun to watch Garrett Crochet, especially as we near the start of the regular season and the pitchers begin to really ramp up. But today will be all about the return of Jarren […]
4 days ago | 1 read
It feels like every year you need more and more subscriptions to watch the Red Sox. Rob Manfred supposedly wants to fix this in the future with nationalized broadcasting but for now, let’s see what’s on the docket for all those games in 2026. You might remember last fall when the Red Sox and Tigers […]
4 days ago | 0 reads
In a WBC littered with big home runs from Red Sox players, Wilyer Abreu now owns the most dramatic moment of the entire tournament. After falling behind Team Japan 5-2 in the third inning and nearly burying themselves even further in the fourth, Venezuela began to fight their way back into the game in the […]
4 days ago | 0 reads
The slow drip of bad Romy Gonzalez news has reached its inevitable conclusion, as Gonzalez just underwent surgery to repair a tear in his left labrum. Believe it or not, this is not the worst case scenario. He’ll go on the 60-day IL and then likely need a lengthy rehab period, but he should be […]
5 days ago | 3 reads
As the Red Sox approach Opening Day, it’s time to start taking at look at the other American League playoff contenders. First up, a team that finished with one more win than the Sox in 2025. What’s This Team’s Deal? After a heartbreaking loss to the Blue Jays in Game 7 of the ALCS kept […]
5 days ago | 2 reads
Alex Cora was right. The Red Sox should win some sort of award for getting their guys ready to play entering the 2026 World Baseball Classic. Boston’s bats hit .310 during pool play and contributed to some of the tournament’s best performances thus far. The most impactful of all entering 2026? Jarren Duran balling out for […]
6 days ago | 2 reads
Good morning! The Red Sox did something yesterday they hadn’t done in a few weeks: they signed someone to the big league roster. Left-handed middle relief had been one of the weakest spots on the team — and given Danny Coulombe’s injury history and age, you could say it still is. But he undeniably fits […]
6 days ago | 2 reads
Who is he and where does he come from? He’s Danny Coulombe and he comes from Scottsdale, Arizona, where he attended one of those powerhouse warm-weather high schools that somehow produces more baseball players in a decade than most New England schools produce in a century. Paul Konerko, Ike Davis, and Brian Bannister are all […]
6 days ago | 2 reads
Is it on TV? Yes, thank Pedro. In a week when there has barely been any televised Red Sox baseball, this one is on NESN at 1:05 PM. That’s especially fortuitous since there’s no World Baseball Classic action today. What’s the lineup? What should we watch for? It’s all about Connelly Early today. With exactly […]
7 days ago | 4 reads
It’s pitching preview time, ladies and gentlemen. Over the next several days, I’ll be writing 10,000 words or so about everyone you might see pitching for the Red Sox to start the season. Last time, we took a look at the primary middle relief options. Today, we’re talking about the last part of the bullpen: the […]
7 days ago | 3 reads
All my homies hate Craig Breslow, but I don’t. I think he’s done a good job under constraints that seem to be slowly lifting as the years go by, as witnessed by the big-money signing of Ranger Suarez this winter, which woulda been unthinkable a few years ago. The team made the playoffs last year […]
7 days ago | 1 read
The pool stage is complete, the matchups are set, and we’re in line for what should be five days of box office baseball starting Friday night when U.S. takes on Canada in Houston and Korea takes on the Dominican Republic in Miami. (Hard to believe the D.R. crowds could get any wilder than they were […]
7 days ago | 2 reads
The Boston Red Sox definitely made upgrades this offseason, though those moves mostly came in the starting rotation with additions in Sonny Gray, Johan Oviedo and Ranger Suarez. Deserved or not, that’s left plenty of underwhelming feelings and question marks about the state of the Red Sox lineup. Boston never replaced Rafael Devers after the […]
8 days ago | 3 reads
What’s been the story of Spring Training so far? If we’re talking big picture stuff, then it’s probably either the battle for the fifth spot in the rotation or the questions about Marcelo Mayer’s role on the team. But if we’re talking strictly about on-field matters, then I think the answer is Braiden Ward, who […]
8 days ago | 1 read
Good morning! The Red Sox are winning the World Baseball Classic… which is actually exactly what happened last time. In the 2023 tournament, Masataka Yoshida roared out of the gate on his way to MVP honors, Yu Chang continually electrified a raucous home soil crowd in Taiwan, and Kiké Hernandez, Jorge Alfaro, and Alex Verdugo […]
8 days ago | 2 reads
To the extent that there ever was any intrigue about whether Caleb Durbin, Marcelo Mayer, or someone else would be playing third base for the 2026 Red Sox, you can put that intrigue to bed. Alex Cora, while going out of his way to clarify that he wasn’t announcing anything official, basically made it official: […]
9 days ago | 2 reads