Letters To Theo

Dear Theo,

I’m sure you’re busy right now, probably too busy to read letters from fans. But trust me, you want to read this one, laminate it, and keep it with you because I’m about to tell you everything you need to do to make the Sox champions again.

I’m not a complete nitwit. I know you’re asking yourself why you’d listen to a guy who writes a wiseass-y column for a smart aleck-y urban sports paper. Good point. You’ve won a World Series and put together a perennial 90+ win team; the best I’ve done is win my Strat-o-matic “Universal Baseball League” championship in high school. You went to Yale. I went to a state college where our only sport was finding parking spaces in the commuter lot. You’ve played with Pearl Jam, and I can’t sing karaoke in this state again without violating a court order.

So why should you listen to the insane ravings of a simpleton like me? Two reasons:

First, because I’m a Theo Epstein fan. So much so, that I might even be able to admit to a Man-Crush, if I wasn’t so homophobic (I won’t even try those mints that squirt in your mouth). I think you’ve done a hell of a job here in a short time. Not every move has worked out. (Byung-Hyung Kim? What was the band smoking that night?) But you’ve gotten the big ones right. Letting Pedro walk took stones because he could have helped us this year. But it was a good call; his contract would have hamstrung the team sooner or later.

Second, because I‘ve earned it. I was living and dying with this club back when you were watching Uncle Jesse sing Stephanie and Michelle to sleep on “Full House.” Back when you were just an itch in your daddy’s pants, I got followed all the way home from school by one of my best friends (a guy I never liked, by the way) who screamed at me, “They choked! They blew a fourteen game lead! Choke artists! Chooooke aaaaahtists!”

I’ve been there all along, and paid my dues. I’ve suffered the slings and arrows of Fenway Park. I’ve sat in the right field grandstand, contorting like a hooker on the Minnesota Vikings cruise boat just so I could see the infield, and still I came back. I was there when Fenway banned cigar smoke, and still I came back. I’ve left the park covered with the second-hand sweat of the fat guy crammed into the seat next to me, and still I came back. The bottom line is, when you charge a guy $35 to park his car, you owe it to him to listen.

First rule: no more Chads. I don’t just mean Bradford and Harville. I mean all the flotsam and jetsam that ran through your bullpen like the Merrimack River this past year: John Halama, Blaine Neal, Mike Remlinger, Matt Perisho and a cast of thousands. I understand why you had to try to cobble together a pitching staff out of everyone else’s rejects. Schilling was hurt. Embree was terrible. Foulke was some combination of hurt and terrible. It was a seller’s market for pitching. To make a trade for pitching, you would have had to gut the farm system, and you weren’t going to pay Cristal prices for Stop & Shop Brand champagne.

That’s fine. After winning it last year, you got a mulligan this year. I know everyone denied they were giving you a free pass, but they didn’t mean it. No one liked losing to the White Sox, but it wasn’t one of the great tragedies. How many people were talking about their dead grandfather afterwards?

But we won’t wait forever. The thing about a mulligan, is that you can only have one. You held onto the young talent this year, now is the time to build a team with them. Jonathan Papelbon is a major league pitcher. Craig Hansen, Manny Delcarmen, Cla Meredith and Jon Lester might be. But I know for sure that the guys you picked up at the Major League Job Lot this year most definitely aren’t. Bring up the young pitchers and stick with them.

Next, forget free agency this year. If you feel you must, keep it to short-term, short money guys. Mostly, don’t forget that, as the Great Belichick says, guys “are what they are.” David Wells came here to be a solid, durable, big-game pitcher, and he delivered. Everyone on Earth knew that when Matt Clement was with the Cubs, he started out hot, then as the year wore on he couldn’t find the strike zone with GPS and pitched his way out of the rotation. Surprise, he came as advertised. Now his teammates wouldn’t trust him to pitch a tent, and we’re stuck with him for two years at $18 million.

Keep Manny. I know you’ve said that the worst thing for a team is to be saddled with bad contracts. I agree, and his is the worst. But is there a player in baseball bluer-chip than him? He guarantees you 35 HRs, 125 RBIs, 3 phoney injuries and one mid-July trade demand every year. And if he demands you keep Kevin Millar, ignore him. A happy Manny hits. But so does an unhappy one.

Revamp the entire infield. I was as disappointed in Edgar Renteria as anyone, but, he was hurt. And like Wells and Clement he has a track record. A good one. The rest of the infield, like the pitching staff, has to get young. The club has been looking for a long-term solution at second base since you were in diapers. Dustin Pedroia’s time is now. Kevin Youkilis has to be taken off the Boston/Pawtucket shuttle forever. Your best prospect, and your best shortstop, is Hanley Ramirez. It’s 1B: Youkilis. 2B: Pedroia. SS: Ramirez. 3B: Renteria, who’s publicly said he’d move aside for the kid. Besides, Edgar’s not worried about how the move will affect his free agency in 2008.

Find a right fielder. Besides getting his uniform dirty, what does Trot Nixon bring? Between his injuries and the need to sit him against lefties, how many truly good games a season does he give you? Seventy? Eighty? Get Bill James on this: by my count, for every time Manny’s run into an out, or thrown to the wrong base, or forgotten how many outs there are, Nixon’s done it at least once. And that’s saying something.

Sign Johnny Damon. At least make every reasonable effort. There are very few guys who can be good, legitimate leadoff hitters. And even fewer guys who can take the white-hot spotlight of Boston (hellooo, Foulke). Damon eats the pressure like Jason Giambi eats HGH pancakes.

So take my advice, Theo and we’ll be back on the duck boats in no time. I anxiously await your reply.

Sincerely,
Jerry Thornton

P.S. Also, see what you can do about bringing the cigars back.