2003-10-21 - 3:10 a.m.

Can�t. Stop. Thinking. About. The. Red. Sox.

Crossing State, where I work, at night, very quickly much colder outside, remembering the dream I got shaken out of, and it hurts. Thinking about crossing that same street several days earlier, hearing some cheers and running to a bar with windows so I could stand outside and see what just happened. Crowds all over the place, milling about, loving the Sox. Thinking how nice it as that so many people cared about something I really care about, even if it was just because they were winning.

I haven�t seen my city so excited in years, and I hadn�t been so excited about my city in years.

It�s not just that they didn�t win. I�m used to that. It�s that the ride is over. The unity I felt with my city-mates is over--we�ve all moved on to our own individual interests. My days aren�t planned around a game anymore. There�s no sense of urgency to get home to my television lest I miss a second of coverage. Bus drivers aren�t announcing Millar homers anymore.

OK--first off, let�s talk about Grady Little. There�s not a ton to say here--he made an inexcusable call (or non-call) by leaving Pedro out there--the only thing he managed to do was to lose the game. We all know this, and there�s no point in discussing it anymore--everyone agrees.

So should Grady be fired? Well, that�s not really the question. As is my understanding, he�s not under contract anymore--it expired at the end of the season (when the Sox lost). He spent the season not knowing what the Sox were going to do with him. So he can�t really be fired.

I like Little, and I�ve lived with being a Little apologist for much of the season. When he left Pedro in the game, however, I knew the game was over and the Sox were done. If I as well as every fan in Boston, as well as probably just about every fan watching, knew what would happen if Pedro was left in, and as a result basically everyone but the only person who could make that call was right, well, that�s kind of an indicator of poor management.

In the world of Baseball, that�s like the head foreman of a factory ignoring the pleas of hundreds of employees claiming to smell smoke, and perhaps being a little nervous himself, but waiting to send everyone out, just to squeeze out an extra half-hour of productivity. The factory burns down, people are hurt, there�s no work for anyone, and the town�s economy grinds to a halt.

But here�s a guy who brought chemistry to the team, one might argue. Okay, that�s true. Compared to Jimy Williams (who I was also very fond of), Little wins the Nobel for chemistry. But here�s a guy who could not grasp the needed sense of urgency involved here. Game freakin� seven of the ALCS, against the Yankees, the history of that rivalry coupled with the fact that Clemens, the former Sox ace, was chased with an exclamation point from the game in what should have been his last ever career start, (hopefully) knowing Pedro�s been given the baby-step treatment with a strict pitch count and that he wilts in late innings, and he keeps Pedro in because Pedro told him he could do it.

Yeah, you get chemistry when you pander to your players. That�s one way to do it.

I think what really did it for me was Little�s comment to the effect that we accomplished a lot this year.

So what, actually, did Little do? Here�s a guy with no hits, no strikeouts, no dramatic catches.

He was given a lineup which included the speedy leadoff Johnny Damon, .400 flirter Nomar Garciaparra, RBI king Manny Ramirez, heart-and-soul of the team Trot Nixon, and a pitching coach who can hit the long ball in Jason Varitek.

He was given a 1-2-3 pitching punch in Martinez-Lowe-Wakefield.

And GM Epstein gave him three career year newcomers in Millar, Mueller (who won the batting title), and (in my view team MVP) David Ortiz.

I expect, no--I demand �accomplishment� from this lineup. This is not a raggle-taggle team of replacement players and washups that nobody expected anything from here, who made it to the postseason, who made it to the ALCS, and who we�re soooo proud of it to make it to Game Seven.

This is a team that lead every major league offensive category save home runs (where they finished third), walks, and fewest strikeouts (I think I have my facts right, if not I�m close).

This is a team without Carl Everett. This is a team where Troy O�Leary (God bless him) is not batting cleanup and Offerman is not the leadoff hitter. This is a team where the GM is not Dan Duquette, where the closer is not Derek Lowe, and where Izzy Alcantrera is not kicking minor league catchers to get to minor league pitchers.

This is a team that has players who have never played with the likes of Craig �the little hurt� Greybeck or Andy Sheets.

And who turned in once in a lifetime years.

Little felt no sense of urgency. He played a hunch at the wrong time to be taking his extra mojo for a test drive. This team played too hard, and they were too good, to be denied a World Series berth. Denied by one man, their own, in one game, which they were winning on their own.

As for chemistry, that�s what won the Angels the World Series last year. Please note that this team finished under .500 this year. That�s what overachieving does, and many of the Sox players were doing this year.

I hope, I really hope, that they can pull it off again next year.

So what about next year?

Okay. Little is done. They got more chemistry outta Millar that they did Little anyway. Little comes back, it�s gonna be on everybody�s minds--the players, and if not the players, the fans, and if not the fans, the media, and if the media, the fans, and if the fans, the players.

Wow. That was a good sentence.

Anyway, with that final distraction outta the way, we�re still left with a team with a propensity for hugging, and a good shot at a grudge match with the Yankees.

I would like to say that I do not know which players are coming back (i.e, their contract status), although I do know that most if not all players do want to play with each other again, and that Epstein must like most of what he saw from the players who made the postseason roster.

In terms of the GM, he has a ton to play with. Many good players have in the past expressed a reluctance to play in Boston, but much of that is that they didn�t want to deal with Boston�s then GM Duquette, a bunch of prima-donna players, Boston�s media, and Boston�s fans. The fact that GM Theo Epstein has proven to be an excellent GM in all aspects of the position, the fact that the only prima-donna left is Pedro Martinez (I think that�s just Manny�s just being Manny should and will become the next that�s just Rickey being Rickey), and the fact that both the Boston fans and media have embraced a greatteam that can win the right way, thus making playing in a mega-baseball town an actual bonus.

So, although GM Theo Epstein has (hopefully) little tinkering to do, I don�t think he�s going to have a tough time signing the players he thinks will help the team next year. Good free agents want money. The right free agents want money, a good team to play for, and a shot at winning a ring. Boston can offer all three.

In terms of the players that are coming back (and again, I don�t keep up on contract status), Boston has an outfield consisting of Ramirez, Damon, and Nixon. Can�t go wrong there.

For the infield, we have Millar, Garciaparra, Mueller, and the sudden slugger, Walker. I�m not sure if the infield going to hit for such a high average next year, but I don�t want to say they�re not going to either. You don�t break this team up, they can do it again. Kevin Millar can hit .134 and you want him on your team--he�s like Brian Daubauch.

Ortiz has emerged as a power hitter and he has to figure out a way to do it again, and if he can�t, do what Grady couldn�t and take him out. He�ll thrive with a new team. That�s just who he is, to me. He either hits over .280 with at least 25 dingers next year, or he hits .180 with eternal signs of coming out of a slump for two months, until he gets traded, at which point he catches fire. He�s the Dante Bichette of 2003.

Varitek and Mirabelli--don�t gotta worry about them. Varitek can manage pitchers better than any other catcher in the AL, he can block the plate like a riot, baserunners aren�t as confident running on him as they have been in the past, and he can hit for power and average. I like that Mirabelli catches for Wakefield because it takes that pressure off of Varitek and gives him a day off, and Mirabelli ain�t no slouch at the plate either. In the NL, if your good pitchers can hit .100 and have a few extra base hits, you�re happy. In the AL, if your good catchers can do 2.5 times that, you�re happy, and that end of the Sox battery exceeds expectations.

Damian Jackson made a pretty good case of being better than Darren talks to his bat Lewis. And I�ll always love Lou Merloni--he�s the kind of Sox player who you know if you recognized him at a dive bar and bothered him for two minutes, he�d wish it had been twenty.

As for pitching, despite this year�s foibles, I�m pretty psyched. Pedro is Pedro, and we�ll see what he can come up with next year. I have him doing just as well this next year as he did last year. I�m just hoping that whoever is coaching him will either give him pitch counts and then stick with them when it counts, or challenge him when it doesn�t, and take it from there.

Lowe is Lowe. Every year is different with him. Typically it�s good year, bad year, good year, bad year, although this year he microcosm�d it by pitching well at home and horribly away. What stat will you think of next? (Thank you, Derek, for that last pitch in Oakland.)

Wakefield is my favorite pitcher and has been for years. He would have been series MVP against the Yankees, too. That�s his luck, especially since he threw out the last Sox pitch of the season (not his fault he threw it).

Is Burkett back? I don�t think he is.

That gives us Kim. What�s his deal? Are we bringing him back? I say we should. Start him some games, maybe he can win ten. If the Sox intend to bring him back, they need to do it now and should put him in counseling for the summer. This is the kid�s final chance to get his shit together or otherwise be the youngest pitcher to make the all-Kerrigan team--shelled out pitchers that can still throw but who need adjustment. If the Sox make Kim their fourth starter and he goes 4-10, that�s OK. It was a good move. He can go 10-4 too. And maybe he can go 14-3.

And then there�s Bronson Arroyo. That�s a bright spot to losing the ALCS--we saw Arroyo pitch very well into the postseason. He could be what Ohka and Fossum weren�t--a good prospect we kept and who delivered. I like him.

And then there�s Suppan. Does he suck? Is he awesome? I think he�s a half-full glass of whiskey that the optimists are willing to gulp down if he pitches poorly. Is he coming back? I don�t know.

But I�m an optimist. Martinez-Lowe-Wakefield is a pretty good lineup, and I don�t care what you say. Between Arroryo, Suppan, Kim, and whoever Epstein picks up, you gotta like the starting pitching for next year�s Sox.

Then there�s the bullpen. The bullpen so oft-mailgned that they made the much-maligned Boston bullpen a running joke for sports media for the entire postseason.

But the bullpen was reliable during the postseason--so with the loss, at least the Sox know who to keep. If a player sucks and loses a game, I want to blame him, not the management for not being able to get a better player. Nothing holds more true here than a GM�s ability to assemble a bullpen. We have Embree and Timlin, the latter of the two being the hidden gem in the pen. I think that GM Theo Epstein will be able to pick up a couple more relief pitchers this offseason, and, hey, maybe Scott Saurbeck might even pull a Scott Willamson.

Speaking of which, it took 162 games, an ALDS championship, and a push to Game Seven to establish a closer for the Sox, and perhaps they found one in Williamson. If so, yay. If not, I�m sure Epstein is not going after Urbina, and will find someone, and Williamson will join Timlin to set up the closer.

The Sox got so close. So close. So close that people living here, for a week or so, were treating baseball like it was 1950. People got into it.

They want to see another good season, or at least the conclusion of one.

Maybe whoever coaches the Sox next year can coax career years out of every player in the lineup. Maybe Pedro will throw a no-hitter at Fenway next year. Maybe the Sox can win it all by getting through the Yanks without histrionics.

Maybe. There�s not a single Boston fan this year that, in back of mind, wanted the Sox to lose, to preserve identity. This isn�t a Target, Gap, or Starbucks moving in and wrecking a 150 year old neighborhood. This is the Zakim bridge. This is the Sox.

Maybe next year is the year. No.

Next year is not the year. There�s been enough next years.

Pretty soon, and I can smell it coming just as I can smell October more strongly than any month save December, it�s gonna be the year.