- First of all I want to say I agree with Katzo in that the Red Sox are now the team to beat in the AL East. With that being said, can we relax with all this talk of the Red Sox dynasty and how they are the ideal franchise in baseball. When you boil it down, this team won for three reasons. They have one of the most fearsome 3-4 combinations in the history of baseball, a dominating closer and an all-time great clutch starting pitcher. I know Lowell, Schilling and others contributed, but those are the reasons the Sox were a step ahead of the rest. Beofre we annoint Theo and the Sox front office as geniuses lests remember a couple things...They have tried to trade (or give away) Manny Ramirez each of the past four seasons. They signed Julio Lugo and JD Drew to contracts combined over $110 million. They paid $51.1 million just to talk to a pitcher how has a 4.40 ERA and did close to nothing in the postseason. If Red Sox fans want to think of their organization as the most well run in baseball, then they must agree that the Yankees were the most well run over the past 10 years. The Red Sox have taken the baton as a team that has so many resources, to the point where they can screw up on players time and time, again but still can cover those up by spending more money. It's not a bad thing, but before we annoint them as Gods, lets be honest about how they got here. Lastly, I am not going to go crazy about Lester or Burgholtz because they have not shown me enough yet. As far as position players, they look good, but more on say the Melky Cabrera level. Not that thats bad, but its not cornerstone type guys.
- I think Joe Torre is a great fit in LA. They have a ton of talent, money and chemistry problems. He will win that division next year and will be playing the Mets in the NLCS in what will shape up to be a great thing for baseball (and the media). A lot will depend on the health of their starting pitching, but they have the bullpen and the line-up already has talent from top to bottom.
- I can't assess the Yankee offseason until we know the Pettitte, Posada and Rivera situations. I am not a huge Joe Girardi fan. I know he was covetted all over baseball, but I will be very interested to see how he handles the young pitching of the Yanks and the media. Remmeber all those great young pitchers he had in Florida came back the next year with major arm problems. Just a thought..
- Giants are the one team in the NFC that can beat the Pats. Two reasons...pass rushing and running the football. My big thing to watch the second half of the season will be how Eli performs, especially the next game against Dallas. Last season in the same situation (6-2) the Giants came home to a huge game against Chicago and Eli played horribly. We know how the season went from there.
- Not much space for NBA talk....My sleeper from each conference are the Grizzlies and the Bucks. I got it right with the Raptors last year, so lets see if I can make this a habit. I admit though that it will be tough for the Grizzlies to make the playoffs in that brutal conference. They will be a tough team to play though. They got a ton of length and potantially very exciting point guard play, plus a long range assassin in Mike Miller. The Bucks have a lot of talent up front and a strong starting backcourt. The East is always up for grabs. They will make the playoffs there.
- Lastly, my Knicks. All I will say is this. Two thing you need to win in this league are defense and an unselfish offense. You need to pass the ball and be able to get stops in big spots. I do not see them able to do either of those two things. Add in the fact that the fanbase is ready to explode, the owner is slowly (hopefully) getting more and more embarrassed, plus Eddy Curry and Zack Randolph might not be able to fit on the team bus together and they team will have problems. At least we got some good sound bytes to expect out of Stephon. For me though, if Isiah is gone by the end of the year this season was a success and we can turn the page towards a hopefully birght future.
STKAFI
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