Boomer's Last Stand

Here's the quote of the year from erstwhile Sox lefty (and now Padres lefty) David "Boomer" Wells:

"I hope it's not my last start...I'd much rather ride off into the sunset with a smile on my face than with a grin."

Good for you, Boomer. Good for you. Why grin when you can smile? Though we're all pretty sure that he meant "grimace" (which for those of us of a certain McDonald's generation, this creates an interesting visual image of big fat David Wells riding on a horse through the chapparral seated behind the big fat friendly purple blob from McDonaldland commercials. Poor, poor horse) it's always fun to mock athlete malapropisms. My favorite of these, all-time, of course is from Mike Tyson:

"I don't need this [stuff]. I don't know what I'm going to do now. Maybe I'll just fade into Bolivia."

Sorry, that just makes me smile every single time. It never makes me grin.

So, back to the baseball at hand, the Padres and the Dodgers showed themselves fully up to the challenge of proving every one of my predictions wrong last night. The Padres have scored one run in two games against a Cardinals team that only has ONE bat in its lineup. Pujols is unbelievable. Three for four last night with an RBI and a run. That was plenty against a Padres team that is hitting around .150 with runners in scoring position. Boomer didn't really pitch that badly- five innings and two runs allowed. I'd take that.

The (only) bright spot for the Padres is the continued dominance of Cla Merideth. I've heard Theo's reasoning behind letting Merideth get away, but still believe that it wasn't a good decision. After his awful implosion in his major-league debut with the Red Sox last year, he lost so much confidence (and velocity). The Sox knew he was good- that's why they brought him up so quickly. He should have undergone the Roy Halliday treatment. Send him all the way back to rookie ball and let him work his way back with no pressure and under his own terms. It seems to have worked out for Halliday and the Jays. Well, now, Merideth is working just fine for the Padres. His stuff is just nasty. The low and away fastballs make hitters look stupid. He made Pujols look stupid. I wish him continued luck. Could he be the heir apparent to Trevor Hoffman?

As for the Dodgers, they just look overmatched, which they're really not. Nomar's down again, which puts the perfecta on the ex-Sox. Grady was embarrassed by that incredibly stupid thrown-out-at-home double play (keep runnin, boys! keep runnin' hard!), Lowe gave up two big homers after having a really good last two months of the season, and now Nomar's out with a quad strain, I believe. Aren't there any ex-Sox out there we can still root for? Is David Eckstein still playing short for the Cardinals? And no, Johnny Damon is not an option.

And speaking of the Yankees-Detroit series, I have just one thing to say. Joel Zumaya. How in the world could Jim Leyland still be dumping Todd Jones out there to close games? Sure, he finished the Yankees off last night, but a guy can't keep getting away with it forever, junkballing like that. But Zumaya blew 125-mph heat (if you believe ESPN's radar guns) past Jeter, Giambi and A-Rod. That's a closer. If Leyland gets past the first round and continues to stick with Todd Jones at the end of the bullpen, I'm revoking my manager of the year vote.

Oh, right, my manager of the year votes. It's going to be Jim Leyland and Joe Girardi. I'll have to look this up, but Girardi has got to be one of the only managers of the year to get fired before the award is announced. That's a crime. Well, he's going to make the Cubs, Nationals, or Giants happy next year.