You played with so many guys over the years, are there many of them that you still keep in close touch with?  I seem to remember you being close with Cecil Cooper, but surely there must have been others.  Have you kept in touch with Freddy Lynn, Dewey Evans, or maybe even Yaz? 

I am still close with Cecil.  He is god parent to my kids and I’m god father of his kids.

One thing that the Red Sox are really good about is keeping players in touch and associated with the team through the Alumni Association.

We see a lot of players that I still see at events like: Pudge Fisk, Rico, Tommy Harper, Dewey, Freddy Lynn, Jim Lonborg, Mike Andrews, Yaz, Louis Tiant, and a lot of other guys.  Once you affiliate with the Jimmy Fund you get to participate in the golf tournaments and see a lot of former players.  The Red Sox are great at using the former players as team ambassadors.  I see guys that I didn’t play with but knew of like Johnny Pesky, Frank Malzone, and Dom DiMaggio every year down spring training.

As former players, we are lucky to have this ownership group who finds ways to keep the former players in touch with each other and with the fans in Red Sox Nation.

On Sunday, I had the best of both worlds while I watched the Red Sox play at the ballpark and watched the Celtics play the Hawks on TV.  I had plenty of time to watch both because an hour and 45 minutes into the game, we were only in the top of the third inning.

I played in, and have seen a number of 7 game series’, similar to the one the Celtics just finished. Some people get concerned about teams being beat up going into the next series after playing 7 games, but facing that adversity motivates a team more than anything else. You really recover pretty quick going into the next series and your confident because you know that other teams have gone home but you are still playing.

I think it is more of a concern to try to keep a team motivated after they win the previous series quickly and have too much time before the next series. For an example, look at last year’s Colorado Rockies in the World Series (or the ‘06 Detroit Tigers).

I don’t think the Hawks series will have any negative impact on the Celtics, provided everyone is healthy.

There have been a lot of questions surrounding the health of David Ortiz. I didn’t talk to him yesterday, but he played Saturday which leads me to think that he is pretty healthy. His rest yesterday probably had more to do with the fact that left handed pitcher Scott Kazmir was starting the game for Tampa Bay (and throwing 94 mph).  I expect Papi to be in the lineup tonight, even though he has had trouble with Bonderman in the past.

Sparky Anderson managed the Tigers for most of my playing career and would tailor the field to suit the opposition. If you were a fast team with good bunters Sparky would harden the dirt at the front of batters box so that you couldn’t deaden a ball in no mans land. The ball would move too fast on the hard infield dirt. Against teams that had good fundamental hitters who would keep the ball on the ground, Sparky would keep the grass long in the infield. This would slow the ball down enough to let the Tiger infielders get to it before they could get into the outfield for base hits. If he was fielding outfielders who were slow or had weak arms, he would keep the outfield grass long to slow any hits out there to keep his players from chasing the ball to the wall. Sometimes those hits in the outfield would come to a complete stop.

There is good golf in the area in Detroit. You have Detroit Country Club out on 6 mile. Also, where the team stayed, in Dearborn, you have the TPC course.  Going to the big city of Detroit at 22 years old was great. Downtown Detroit was huge, it had great nightlife, and coming from a small town, everything just seemed better.

I remember watching you when I was in high school and how they always talked about the strength of your forearms and your bat speed. I also remember an “urban legend” that you could break a bat at the handle just by swinging and flicking your wrists. Any truth to that?
Tom F.
Tyngsboro, MA

I did it twice in games. On two separate occasions I broke bats without ever making contact with the pitch and both were check swings. I think one was in Oakland and a curveball started out high and I committed to swing, but when it broke downward on me and I tried to stop my swing I was left just holding the bat handle in my hands. Tony Armas also did it once when he was with the Red Sox.

Any strength I had was probably hereditary because my dad was a strong guy. I never lifted weights when I was growing up, nor was I encouraged or allowed to. I built strength just by playing a lot of sports. In high school I played football, baseball, basketball, and ran track. Back then, we didn’t have weights in high school. Come to thing of it, they didn’t have them in the minors or majors either.

To prepare for games, the team would perform calisthenics and wind sprints before we started throwing the ball and trying to get loose. We had one trainer, not the team of strength, conditioning, and nutrition experts that teams have today. Our trainer had some workouts for us but most of it was related to baseball. The guys who had power that I played with, like Yaz and Rico, didn’t lift weights.

You look around the baseball locker room these days, and these guys aren’t in baseball shape. You’re playing with a 5 oz ball and a 32 ounce bat. There’s no need to lift 350 lbs. That’s not baseball muscle, that’s muscle so that the players can fill out their jerseys.

Because of this obsession with strength training, you see more injuries in the last 10 years than you saw in 10-15 years prior to that. Could you see Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb jumping hurdles in spring training? They didn’t get hurt back then and they were some pretty good ball players.

Last week a story came out in which Torii Hunter remarked that he heard racist taunts while playing as a visitor at Fenway. Other people have made remarks to the media about racism at Fenway over the years and, though I can’t speak for what another player has experienced, in my 15+ years of playing in Boston, I never encountered this type of behavior directed at me, a teammate, or opposing player.

Actually, I never really heard of this type of behavior at any of the opposing ballparks that I played at. We always thought Yankee fans would be the worst but they’re just like any place else. Fans are gonna say “you suck” because you hurt their ball club. If you are just making outs and errors in the field, they won’t say a word. But when you do something to hurt their team such as hitting a home run, stealing a base, or throwing out a runner the fans will get on your case.

But as for racism, I NEVER had any experience like that. I think for a situation to escalate to that level, you have to do something to incite that type of behavior. If you talk about the fans or acknowledge their taunts by responding to them, that is when the situation can deteriorate into the type of behavior Torii alluded to. Again, I can’t say for certain what Torii experienced or what led up to it, you would have to ask him about that.

We have another winner in the Gift Card Contest.  Congratulations to John from Maine! He is the winner of the $200 Sullivan Tire Gift Card for this week.

Here is a picture from boston.com of the near hole in one from the Pitching in for Kids fundraiser on Monday.

So, they changed the rotation so that Matsuzaka will pitch tonight instead of Lester. I have to say that Daisuke Matsuzaka’s chances of winning 20 games this season are very good. Rick Sutcliffe predicted 20 wins last week on ESPN.com and you have to favor Matsuzaka’s chances at this point.

For the majority of the season, this team will not be the same team offensively that you saw last night and in Tampa this weekend. They are going to hit and the staff will get the run support to win games. Big Papi is not a sub .200 hitter. Mike Lowell’s return should give the offense an additional boost.

What the offense needs to do is score early and deliver in the important situations. Last week there was a situation where they had a man on third with one out and couldn’t score the run. Whoever was up hit ball to the right side but didn’t elevate. With the infield in, you need to hit it hard and elevate to advance the runner. With the fielders playing in so close in that situation you can’t hit it to the pitchers mound, you need to get past the infield dirt.

What happened with the Red Sox offense? This weekend, the Red Sox just got outplayed. If you look at history between these two teams over the past 3 years - and even dating further back to when Pedro was here. The Rays always play us tough. They get good pitching and, though they are a small market time and lack the big name stars featured in the lineup of their divisional rivals, the Rays get up to play high priced teams.

Like Jerry Remy said: at the first game of the series, there were only 3000 fans but Sunday night had a full house.

The Toronto team coming in tonight looks to be different than the team we played at the beginning of April. Daisuke comes back to take on their ace, and if we can get a couple of runs early, I like our chances.

Other Sports:
I watched Adam Scott win on Sunday, but my wife has been following the NBA (she’s a big fan) and we are just waiting for the Celtics to take care of this. Just like in any sport the further you advance, the tougher it gets.

The young players on the Hawks were very physical last night and I have noticed the call for teams to be more physical, not just in basketball, but in all sports. You don’t want to give in to the other team, but at the same time antagonizing the other team isn’t a part of sports. All of the face making and chest pounding is not within the spirit of competition; it sets a bad example for the high school and college students who participate in organized athletics. If the fans want to see yelling, scowling, and physical play, they should be watching the WWE.

Watching the NFL draft this weekend illustrates how much draft has changed over the years and the difference between the MLB and NFL drafts. I was drafted in the first round of the 1971 draft and, though they had told me I was going to be drafted, I had little idea of what to expect. There were no draft parties in those days and it was hardly the media event that is covered in all phases by ESPN and other media outlets.

A scout had given me a sheet that listed some of the other prospects that were to be drafted. None of the names jumped out at me at the time, but George Brett, Mike Schmidt, and Frank Tanana did end up having successful careers.

On that day back in 1971 I went to the local billiard hall in South Carolina. I shot pool with one of my friends and eventually, someone told me that I had been picked up. I went home and my dad told me that I had been drafted by the Red Sox in the first round.