Of course no one will actually confirm that this 2013 Red Sox roster is official, but if you ask me, it looks pretty solid so I’m going with it. There was no ceremonial announcement that Jackie Bradley Jr. was a definite to be in New York on Opening Day but word on the street is he is headed to NY with the club. [Yay!] After finishing up the spring with impressive numbers — .419 average and a 1.120 OPS — it would’ve have been a damn shame if he found himself in Pawtucket.

So without further ado…

Starting pitchers:
Jon Lester, Clay Buchholz, Ryan Dempster, Felix Doubront, John Lackey
No surprises here, although I thought Felix might grab the #3 spot.

Bullpen:
Joel Hanrahan, Andrew Bailey, Andrew Miller, Koji Uehara, Junichi Tazawa, Alfredo Aceves, Clayton Mortensen
Daniel Bard, who the Sox broke last season, will start the season in Portland! Sounds like a rebuilding year for Bard. And I wonder what the over/under is on when Aceves has his first whiny meltdown.

Catchers: 
Jarrod Saltalamacchia, David Ross
And once again, Ryan Lavarnway is sent to Pawtucket. He’s like the high school senior that can’t seem to make the varsity club. *sigh*

Infielders:
Mike Napoli, Dustin Pedroia, Jose Iglesias, Will Middlebrooks, Pedro Ciriaco, Mike Carp
With Stephen Drew on the DL (WHAT? a Drew on the DL?), Jose Iglesias will get a shot to show us his moves and his greatly improved offense. He did hit a respectable .294 this spring.

Outfielders:
Shane Victorino, Jacoby Ellsbury, Jackie Bradley Jr., Jonny Gomes, Daniel Nava
I’m most excited about the outfield this season — Bradley, Ellsbury and Victorino could make up one of the best defensive outfield we’ve seen in a loooong time!

Tomorrow’s the day, Sox fans. The Red Sox visit the New York Yankees for an Opening Day matinee with Jon Lester taking on CC Sabathia. Game time is 1:05pm. Where will you be?

*blink blink* Did that really happen last night? Honestly, if I hadn’t been there to witness the carnage first hand, I never would’ve believed it. I almost think it was worse to experience it in person. I felt… violated.

To properly recap this game would take more pages than you’re probably willing to read so I’m going to make it simple. Basically every inning but the fourth had some action. Some of the action made me feel incredibly happy and some of the action made me want to jump onto the field and stab every member of the team — starting with those who did NOT attend Johnny Pesky’s funeral (yes, I’m still hung up on that and I’m sure I will be fore the rest of the season… at least.)

First Inning:
Angels fail to score. Red Sox score one.
SCORE: 1-0 Sox

Second Inning:
Angels fail to score again. Franklin Morales seems to have his stuff. Red Sox score five capped by a three-run dinger by Dustin Pedroia! OH MA GAHD! *happy dance*
SCORE: 6-0 Sox

Third Inning:
Angels score eight runs. Yes, eight. A lot of bad shit happened. The Angels sent 13 men to the plate. Morales forgot how to pitch, he walked in runs. There was a fielding error, a lot of hits and a stolen base. Clayton Mortensen replaced Morales. He sucked too. Junichi Tazawa replaced Mortensen and finally got them out of the inning. It was bad. The whole inning was such a blur to me since I couldn’t see the field too well through my angry eyes. Red Sox failed to score.
SCORE: 8-6 Angels

Fourth Inning:
No scoring. Holy crap.
SCORE: 8-6 Angels

Fifth Inning:
Mark Melancon replaced Tazawa, holds Angels scoreless. Red Sox score one run.
SCORE: 8-7 Angels

Sixth Inning:
Angels fail to score again. Red Sox score two on a Mike Aviles home run and a couple of doubles by Pedro Ciriaco (who went 4-6) and Jacoby Ellsbury (who went 3-6).
SCORE: 9-8 Sox

Seventh Inning:
Andrew Bailey replaced Melancon. Angels score one on a Mike Trout RBI single to tie it up. Red Sox fail to score.
SCORE: 9-9

Eighth Inning:
Angels fail to score. Red Sox score two runs on four singles by Scott Podsednik, Ciriaco, Ellsbury and Dustin Pedroia (who went 4-6).
SCORE: 11-9 Sox

Ninth Inning:
Alfredo Aceves came in for the save…and blew it. Vernon Wells hit a questionable homer but no one bothered to wake Bobby Valentine up to challenge it. The other two runs came on three singles, a walk and an error. Red Sox came back with one of their own on a Cody Ross homer in the bottom of the inning to tie it back up.
SCORE: 12-12

Tenth Inning:
Aceves came back out. WTF? And he immediately gave up a go ahead home run to Kendrys Morales. Craig Breslow replaced Aceves and the Angels score another on a single and a double by Vernon Wells. Red Sox come back with one in the bottom of the inning, but it’s a too little, too late.
FINAL SCORE: 14-13 Angels

Between the two teams, this game saw a total of 27 runs, 38 hits, 21 strike outs and five home runs. The game lasted a painful 4 hours and 34 minutes. Here’s the link to another frustrating night of Red Sox baseball. The KC Royals come in tonight at 7:10pm for the first game of a four-game series. Jon Lester tries to win his third straight as he takes on Bruce Chen.

Here’s a (not so) fun fact: The Sox broke a 170 game streak last night. This is the FIRST TIME since May of 1970 they lost a game after scoring 13 runs. (Stat courtesy of Gordon Edes’ Twitter feed.) Just goes to show you what kind of season this has been. And now add into the mix the bad mojo of not attending Johnny Pesky’s funeral as a united team and they’ll be lucky if they don’t just vanish from the standings all together. That’s sort of what I’m hoping happens.

I take back everything I said the other day about how this west coast swing was going to be a cinch. I TAKE IT BACK!! Ok, can we please just win already?

Last night was, in short, a pitching disaster. Daisuke Matsuzaka, still in search of that elusive first win of 2012, was… well… horrible. Granted, he did claim to have a (as Bobby Valentine called it) “a crick in his neck,” yet he took the mound anyway. Honestly, I think a high school pitcher could’ve done a better job.

Dice K left the game after 28 pitches. His line was not impressive. The Oakland A’s bashed out five runs on four hits, including home runs by former Red Sox players Josh Reddick (his 19th of the year!) and Brandon Moss. But… he was injured. So do I forgive him for his bad outing? Probably not. It’s back to the DL most likely for Dice K and a game of eeny, meeny, miny, mo to pick the next member of the starting rotation.

Maybe Clayton Mortensen? He came in to relieve Dick K and pitched five innings, giving up just one more run on two hits. He’s been relegated to relief work for the most part with the Red Sox, but did start when he played in Colorado. He can’t be any worse… or more painful to watch. Despite the loss, Mortensen told reporters he was happy with his performance.

“It’s always nice to be able to go out and pick our team up. When something like that happens, it’s huge to go out there and soak up some innings so our bullpen can be fresh for the rest of our series against these guys,” said Mortensen. “They play us tough, so we’re going to need all the pitching we can have. So it was nice, I was happy with it.”

I can’t even discuss the offense right now. It’s just… yeah. One run isn’t going to cut it if you want to win.

Will Middlebrooks didn’t play last night and will probably be making a trip to the DL with a hamstring issue. Now that’s what you call bad timing.

Click here for the uninspired box score, courtesy of the Red Sox. Jon Lester tries to right the ship tonight against Bartolo Colon who is just back from a short trip to the DL. David Ortiz will try, yet again, to hit #400.

On another note, it’s going to be an exciting upcoming week for Portland fans. Carl Crawford makes strides to get back to Boston and will be playing for the Sea Dogs tonight. Ryan Sweeney could find himself in Portland possibly on Thursday. And Jacoby Ellsbury, who hit a 2-run homer for Fort Meyers last night, should be with Dogs later this week. *runs off to buy tickets*

Red Sox Loss = Pie Chart

Six hours and seven minutes. That’s how long it took the Red Sox to lose to the Baltimore Orioles this afternoon/evening in 17 innings. I’m not even sure where to start. I actually have the urge to just end this post right here and post a picture of one of my dogs. That’s how painful this game was. Their losing streak is at five games and they managed to only win one game on this most recent homestand. Shit is looking bleak, yo.

Clay Buccholz just flat out stinks this year. He, yet again, gave up five earned runs in this game which means he has now given up five earned runs in six consecutive starts. Really, Clay? I’m sure this is some kind of record and not the good kind. The bullpen, on the other hand, was outstanding. The combination of Andrew Miller (just back from the DL), Matt Albers, Vicente Padilla, Alfredo Aceves, Franklin Morales, Rich Hill and Scott Atchison managed to pitch 12.1 scoreless innings.

But this game went 17 innings and outlasted the bullpen. Darnell McDonald (yes, that Darnell McDonald who sometimes plays left field) came in to pitch the 17th. Darnell hasn’t pitched since August of 2011. Darnell gave up a three-run homerun to Adam Jones. Darnell took the loss. I’m confused. Didn’t they still have one pitcher left in the bullpen? I could’ve sworn there was a lonely Clayton Mortensen left sitting there. Or did I imagine that?

The offensive highlight of today’s game goes to young Will Middlebrooks. I love this kid and today, he didn’t disappoint. Will hit his first major league homerun today — a grand slam to tie the game at five. I’ll even forgive his base running blunder. Other than Ryan Sweeney’s four hits, there wasn’t really anything else to get excited about. And just when we though maybe Adrian Gonzalez was back on track, he went 0 for 8 with two strike outs. The second strike out happened to come in the bottom of the 17th against Chris Davis (not a member of their pitching staff) with two men on and no outs. Oh and Cody Ross struck out five times.

I have nothing else to say. This game drained me. See for yourself — click here for the box, courtesy of the Red Sox.

Next up — a three game series in Kansas City. Felix Doubront will toe the rubber on Monday to try and stop the bleeding. First pitch is at 8:10 EST. Here’s hoping he has a good outing, I think this bullpen is toast just about now and could really use a break. I could use a break too.

The Red Sox lost to the Oakland A’s last night. I know I should be writing some clever recap of the game’s events. I just… can’t. Instead, I give you bullet points. Eastwood-style.

Look, I made a graph about my feelings.

The Good:

• Freshly called-up Will Middlebrooks went 2 for 3 in his 2012 debut with the Red Sox and stole a base.
• David Ortiz continues to tear it up going 2 for 4. He is my only bright spot right now.
• Clayton Mortensen, who was acquired in the Marco Scutaro trade this past off-season (and spent the last month in Pawtucket) pitched three innings of shut-out relief.

The Bad:

• Adrian Gonzalez went 0 for 4, leaving four runners on base and striking out twice, once with the bases loaded in the 7th. Dude, what the FFFFFFFFF?
• Daniel Bard looked like he was going to do… ok. Until the 6th. Maybe he’s just not ready to pitch all those innings yet.
• This offense, that is 2nd in the American League in hitting despite the dismal record, went 0 for 13 with runners in scoring position. Yup, a big fat goose egg. This makes me stabby.

The Ugly:

• The Sox are two games below .500 and still reside alone… in the basement… of the AL East. Gross.
• They just lost 2 of 3 to an Oakland A’s team that has the WORST team offense in the MAJORS!! Again, what the FFFFFFFF?
• This Jekyll and Hyde thing is getting old. We know the offense can kick ass and the pitching staff has real potential so why can’t they get their shit together?

This is how I really feel about writing a recap of last night’s game:

I do realize that it’s a long season and we’ve got several months to go, but I tend to live in the moment, and I’m not liking this moment one bit. Here’s a link to the pathetic box, courtesy of the Red Sox. The Sox are off tonight… thankfully.