I Wonder What the Red Sox Think About John Lackey

                                                                                                     Sports Illustrated

*Blatant self-promotion

Editors Note: I am in a bad mood. I am a Red Sox man first and foremost, but I live and breath all Boston sports. The Bruins played a stinker today. Anyone who follows me on Twitter (@Red_SoxThoughts *) knows that I am none too pleased right now. So be aware, negative blog coming... 

For another note, I'd love some constructive criticism. I love sports debate, and I am very interested on what you guys think. Agree, disagree, I will respond to your thoughts.

On to the blog...

The Red Sox were supposed to play Wednesday night, and John Lackey was supposed to take the mound. However, Mother Nature had other plans, and Lackey figured he would be taking the mound on Friday against the Blue Jays. The Red Sox had other plans. On Thursday, they announced they would be giving the ball to Clay Buchholz, who would usually be getting the ball after Kermit, err, Lackey. Mr. Lackey will not be given the ball against the A's.

The Red Sox are being very un-insulting during all of this. According to them, its because they do not want to mess up anyone's rest schedule. Well, that makes sense. We can't let anybody be one day off of their scheduled start, given two days notice. Instead, let's let all of our starters be on normal rest, except forget our highest paid arm; he'll be fine with his extra week of rest. 

Of course, I am being completely sarcastic right now. Mark this date on your calendars folks. Today is the first day I am completely negative, and I am a 98% pessimistic being. This just shows that the Red Sox front office is admitting that they made a huge mistake in assuming Lackey could be a front-end pitcher. Guess who Lackey's two best opponents are. If you guessed Seattle and Oakland, you win! (Except I am a broke college student, so I could give you an old textbook....for the right price?) He is good against the bad offenses the AL West has to offer, which included Texas, who was bad until last year, which was Lackey's first year here in Beantown. Let me put it this way. Remember the other night when I declared DiceK should be out of the roation? Well, not only is he out of the rotation, but apparently the team has more confidence in him than Lackey!

Seriously, the Red Sox could have kept their starters on the same rest and put Lackey on during DiceK's start. Instead, they kept Dice-K, who just had one of the worst starts I can remember, and held off Kermit. While I disagree with that move, that is not the point of this blog, I think it is very telling. It just shows what the Boston front office thinks of their major signing of 2010. They signed him expecting him to be a top-of-the-rotation guy, and now they give up on him in April 2011. I believe they still hope for strong outings for him in a Red Sox uniform, but I no longer think they expect it, unless it's against bad offenses. Why else would they expect him to pitch against the Rays (bad offense) and then say he'll disrupt other pitcher's routine against the Blue Jays (decent offense), and then let him pitch agains the A's. (bad offense, and hey! it is against the juggernaut otherwise known as the AL West!).

I respect the hell out of the Red Sox admitting a bad mistake, but that shouldn't defer them from criticism about the move itself. Lackey was never going to be a top 2 starter for a championship team.