Here is a look at some of the news from spring training at Red Sox camp.
There was a Japanese invasion at City of Palms on Monday night as the Red Sox actually couldn’t have any fans come to the game due to the 10,000 Japanese media members that took over the ballpark. The reason why is Hideki Matsui made the trip from Tampa with the Spankees and because of the Red Sox Japanese imports, Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hideki Okajima. Ok, I am joking about the 10,000 media members but judging from what I saw on the tele, there was alot of Japanese media.
This will definitely bring an added dimension to the greatest rivalry in sports. Both Matsuzaka and Matsui were huge stars in Japan before they came over. Matsui has been here for 5 years so he knows what to expect. They are being compared to each other in the sense that Matsuzaka is the pitching Matsui, meaning that he is to pitching as what Matsui is to hitting as far as their star power in the land of the rising sun.
With Matsui already established as a Major League star and being six years Matsuzaka’s elder, the Boston right-hander paid the proper form of respect.
According to a translator, Matsuzaka said to Matsui, “I’m sorry to bother you right before your game. [Matsui] said, ‘Don’t worry about it, thanks for coming over to say hello.’ He wished me good luck, so I wished him the same and said thanks.”
Things were more personal between former teammates Okajima and Matsui.
“Long time no see,” Okajima told Matsui. “He said to me, ‘How have you been?’ I was really excited to see him. I wish we had more time to talk. He told me he’d give me his number later and would see me during the season. I’m looking forward to meeting him again soon and having dinner with him.”
The Red Sox made 5 more cuts on Monday. They returned Rule 5 draftee, Nick Debarr, to the Devil Rays. They also sent down pitchers Abe Alvarez and Kyle Jackson, catcher Dusty Brown, and outfielder Kerry Robinson.
Jonathan Papelbon made an appearance on the mound Monday. It was in a simulated game against Sox minor leaguers. He threw a total of 62 pitches to the hitters as he started to work on his pitches a little more. Being a closer last season, he really didn’t have to use his full arsenal. So now he is using spring training to redevelop it.
Concentrating on expanding his repertoire as he goes back to the rotation, Papelbon threw several curveballs along with his fastball and splitter among his 62 pitches (42 for strikes).
“It feels really good,” Papelbon said of his curveball. “I’m just working on throwing it in certain counts, 1-and-1, 1-and-0, and building it to where I can throw it in any count. That’s going to be a big part of my success this year and it’s something me and [pitching coach] John Farrell worked on today.
“You have to be able to throw other pitches for strikes in any count, and that’s the point I want to get at. Hopefully, it gets where it needs to be. That’s the big difference [in starting]. You’re having to go deeper into games. You’re having to throw more strikes and keep hitters on their toes.
Terry Francona, Brad Mills and Curt Schilling will not be with the team in the morning on Tuesday as they will be taking a Matsuzaka One (my new name for John Henry’s plane) to New Jersey for the funeral services for former Phillies coach John Vukovich. Francona and Mills were coaches when Vukovich was a coach in Philadelphia. Schilling has stated that Vukovich “was a father figure to him.”
Executive Director of the Players Union, Donald Fehr, was in camp on Monday night to give the players an update on the as to what is going on with the union. One of the questions asked to him was about the status of former replacement players if they would ever be accepted into the union. He replied with a no answer to that question.
No, and at this point I wouldn’t expect them to be,” Fehr said. “I think the situation is I don’t know of instances on a personal level of players having difficulty with any of the individuals anymore. We certainly represent them for all purposes, just as if they were members. They really don’t come to the union meetings or participate in the licensing program. And, I don’t envision that being revisited at this point.”
The Red Sox currently have one replacement player on their roster, Brendan Donnelly, and have had two others before, Kevin Millar and Lou Merloni. Both of them were fan favorites and leaders of the team, so I don’t see there being a problem with Donnelly not being a member of the union to the Red Sox players.
That’s all for now. Be sure to get your exercise with the half marathon around the AL camps later on this morning.
