Baseball Toaster was unplugged on February 4, 2009.
When you are a kid playing baseball it is pure fun and worrying about what team you are on should be the least of your concerns.
—Tim Bawmann, Lowell Spinners GM
The first thing the Red Sox did after winning the World Series was force Doug Mientkiewicz, the first baseman who made the Series-ending putout, to relinquish control of the final-out ball for the good of, basically, all humanity. Mientkiewicz called it his "retirement fund." The Sox called it "ours".
Mientkiewicz finally agreed to loan the ball to the Sox and then was promptly traded to the Mets.
Amidst all the blather regarding the ball, Larry Lucchino, Sox President, proposed changing team policy to "avoid another fight over, say, the ball that clinches the first Red Sox World Series repeat since 1916."
In December the Sox filed a lawsuit to retain the ball.
The Sox then scheduled the doling out World Series rings to personnel ostentatiously in front of their rival, Yankees, in the home opener. Even though the Yankees were fine with that plan ("The Red Sox won them, they earned them and they have the right to pick the game and date to present them and it's not a personal affront to our players or to me," said George Steinbrenner), the Sox demurred and moved the ceremony until overwhelming fan support for the home opener forced them to move the ceremony back to the home opener.
This past offseason has witnessed the Red Sox front office's own Peyton Place with Theo "The Rubber Band Man" Epstein quitting as GM, returning in some undefined position, and then assuming the GM role again.
And as if the Red Sox Nation didn't have enough to worry about, they needed to create another pointless issue. The Single-A affiliate of the Sox, the Lowell Spinners, is trying to remove the team name Yankees from New England little leagues out of concern for stress caused to young players. They offer Spinners as an alternative, of course, with no thought to the free advertising they would receive.
"We figured the easiest and best solution was replace those Yankee teams with the Spinners, who are part of the Boston Red Sox system," Bawmann said. "We would like to make a point that this promotion is all in good fun and is merely meant to appeal to Red Sox Nation in New England."
The season hasn't even started and I am sick of the Red Sox. If there is a god, please let them go 0-162. It would be wicked.
losers.
I'm gonna go point the Bronx Banter crew over here.
It's just baseball.
Nothing's gonna come of this (as far as LL team name changes) -- it's all just a marketing scheme to get people to take notice of the Spinners -- and it seems to be working.
I wanted to respond, but Tony Montana beat me to it:
"What's boring..? Hey you know what your problem is, pussycat… You got nothing to do with your life, that's what. Why don't you get a job, y'know? Be a nurse, work with lepers, blind kids, that kind of [beep]. Anything beats lying around all day waiting for me to [beep] you."
Here's the site: http://www.lowellspinners.com/
They're in their 11th season as a Red Sox affiliate.
Sometimes I wish we could record us saying our comments - then the dripping sarcasm would come through loud and clear.
If the Boston Red Sox suggested the little league Yankees team renaming, it'd be embarrassing. As it is, this is just another way for a minor league team to get noticed. (The Lowell Spinners also gave away Jack Kerouac bobbleheads a few years ago...)
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