I was hesitant to write a blog post with yet another picture of Josh Beckett gracing it but given the news that Josh is going to be the Red Sox Opening Night pitcher I just had to.
Yes, Tito announced today that Josh would get the nod on Opening Night which was rather anticlimactic after he accidentally spilled the beans at a press conference yesterday. The real news today was the back end of the rotation and what was going to happen there. As expected, Lester will follow Beckett on April 6th and Lackey on April 7th against the Yankees. Then it gets interesting with Wakefield on April 9th against the Royals, back to Beckett again on the 10th, and finally Buchholz gets a turn on the 11th. Tito's reasoning is that Beckett would pitch his second game on 6 days rest instead of 7, which could be detrimental to him. I'm wondering about Buchholz though. He's going to go a long while without pitching in a real game. And of course, who knows what will happen when and if Dice-K finally is ready to enter the rotation.
Wakefield has already proven during Spring Training that he is up to the task despite what many thought over the winter. Buchholz on the other hand has been maddeningly inconsistent, showing shades of what got him sent down to the minors last year. I'm hoping that Clay can get back in a groove and show us that he can be the pitcher we always thought he was capable of.
In other Red Sox news today, Mike Lowell fouled a ball off his knee resulting in a contusion. Just another incident in a string of bad luck that seems to have been following Mikey around since last year.
The Red Sox beat the Blue Jays today 3-2 with Lester going 6 innings with 6 hits and 2 unearned runs. John Lackey pitches tomorrow against the Orioles and old timer Alan Embree is expected to pitch in relief.
And I promise my next post will not include a Beckett picture and perhaps I will even discuss hitting. Or fielding. Or something not to do with pitching.
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