The Year That Was.

I'm not sure why but I wasn't going to do an end of the year post. But then it occurred to me that I had this goofy little oddball musical theatre theme going for this season and there was a perfect song in RENT. [Aside: I know that there are a lot of RENT fans out there but the show has not aged well. It's odd because La Boheme hasn't suffered the same fate. It's probably because RENT set out to be super-edgy and now it's not--it's just super full of itself.] So how could I resist?

So Year in Review:

April: There were a couple of excellent games in April; Wakefield's near no-hitter (April 15) and subsequent eleven game winning streak, Jason Bay tying it up off Mariano Rivera in the ninth and Youkilis walking off with the win on April 24, Varitek's grand slam off AJ Burnett (April 25), and on April 27 at Cleveland the teams traded zeros for nine innings until Jason Bay hit a three-run home run off of Kerry Wood. But the winner for best game has to be Ellsbury's steal of home on April 26.

The worst game in April had to be the twelve inning disaster in Oakland on April 14. The game was almost four and a half hours long--not the best thing for a game that started at ten. Matsuzaka lasted only one inning, giving up five runs on five hits and two walks. The bullpen mostly held it together after that though. Happy went four innings, no runs; Manny Del went one and two-thirds, no runs; Ramon Ramirez went one and a third, no hits, no runs; Okajima went two innings, no hits, no runs; Papelbon went one inning, no hits, no runs; Javier Lopez struggled though--a walk, a ground out, a walk, a walk to load the bases, a strike out, and a single that brought in the tying run but was a really close play at first. The other choice would be Matt Garza's almost no-hitter (April 30). Featuring: Seven earned runs from Josh Beckett, five from Javier Lopez and his right-field debut, and two-thirds of an inning pitching from Jonathan Van Every.

May: The good: Not so much a great Red Sox moment as a Yankees Suck moment but on May 5, pugly Joba Chamberlain performed beautifully in relief of himself--he still got the loss after giving up four runs in the first inning and Beckett was able to hold them to a Damon three-run home run. And on Thursday May 7, the Red Sox scored 12 runs in the bottom of the sixth inning against Cleveland.

The bad: Papelbon blew a save against the Mets on May 23; he gave up a home run to Omir Santos that scrapped it's way over the wall. And on May 3, Carl Crawford stole six bases in one game.

The ugly: I would nominate May 28 in Minnesota. In the seventh inning, Jeff Bailey looks like he misses homeplate as he tries to score on a Dustin Pedroia sacrifice fly. Mike Redmond argues and is tossed. Ron Gardenhire argues and is tossed. In the next half inning, Josh Beckett says something to the umpire, Varitek jumps up to defend him and gets tossed. Terry Francona tries to defend Varitek and he gets tossed. Very strange.

June: On June 3, Josh Beckett had a no-hitter through seven and two-thirds. On June 4, the Sox continued to not swing at bad pitches as Dontrelle Willis fell apart before their eyes (he couldn't make it out of the third inning.) On June 6, Lester was perfect through six and one-third. On June 21, Nick Green hit a walk-off home run against the Braves.

The worst game of June would have to be June 30 at Baltimore. John Smoltz looked to be on his way to his first win; he went four innings and gave up only one run. Then the skies opened up. When the game resumed the bullpen coughed up a nine run lead and gave up ten runs in two innings.

July: Conversely, one of the best games on July was on July 1st. The Orioles had Bergesen going and the Sox came up with only one run in eight innings. But after he was pulled from the game in the ninth inning, the Oriole bullpen did their best Red Sox from the night before impersonation: Jim Johnson walked Pedroia and gave up a home run to Youkilis; George Sherrill got two strike outs (Jason Bay and David Ortiz), Ellsbury got a single, Bailey walked, Varitek walked to load the bases, Rocco Baldelli hit a single and tied the game, then Drew walked; Danys Baez got them out of the inning. To the top of the eleventh--Ellsbury hit a double, took third on a Baldelli fly ball, and scored the winning run on a Julio Lugo single.

In terms of bad days on July 30 the David Ortiz PEDs scandal broke; he did hit a three-run home run to win the game that day, though. That was a pretty bad day.

August: August brought Victor Martinez and that wasn't a bad thing. On August 14 in Texas, the Rangers had a four to two lead heading into the ninth inning and then all hell broke loose against Frank Francisco. David Ortiz doubled. Varitek singled, Ortiz went to third. Ellsbury singled, Varitek went to second, and Ortiz went home. Chris Woodward struck out. Clay Buchholz was put in to run for Varitek but, you see, he was thrown out at home trying to score on a double. From second base. Rally killer? You might think so but not with Victor Martinez in the lineup. Martinez hit a double; knocked himself on the helmet and knocked in two runs to put the Sox up by one. But they weren't done yet. Jason Bay singled and Martinez scored. Then JD Drew topped it off with a home run. Other games? Paul Byrd beat Roy Halladay on August 30.

I'd have to pick the fifteen inning affair at New York on August 7 as the bad game for August. Five and a half hours and fourteen innings of nothing before a two-run home run by Alex Rodriguez to end it.

September: September 16 against the Angels was possibly the game of the year. Paul Byrd pitched five and one-third of an inning and gave up three runs, when he was pulled the Sox were behind nothing to three. In the bottom of the sixth they pulled ahead 5-3. In the top of the seventh, Ramon Ramirez was pitching after Saito got the first out and then hit Vlad Guerrero with a pitch. Torii Hunter popped out. Two out. Kendry Morales struck out. Three out. Except, Varitek didn't catch the ball and Morales hustled down to first. Ramon may have been rattled. Kendrick singled, Guerrero scored. Rivera doubled, both Morales and Kendrick scored. Napoli doubled, Rivera scored. Okajima came in and got the fourth out by striking out Figgins. The damage at the end of the inning was that the Angels were once again leading, this time 7-5. The Sox didn't respond in the seventh and Oki/Manny Del were able to get through the eighth. Bottom of the eighth, Kevin Jepsen pitching. David Ortiz singles. JD Drew pinch hits for Brian Anderson and walks. Josh Reddick pinch hits for Jason Varitek and grounds into a force out, Ortiz takes third. Darren Oliver replaces Jepsen as the pitcher. A wild pitch to Casey Kotchman moves Reddick to second. Kotchman grounds out, Ortiz scores, and Reddick moves to third. Alex Gonzalez walks. Ellsbury singles and Reddick scores to tie the game. Pedroia flies out to end inning. Daniel Bard is brought in for the ninth inning. He got two outs (both ground outs) but then gave up three singles in a row to again put the Angels up by one. The Angels went to their closer, Brian Fuentes. Jason Bay popped out. One out. Mike Lowell flied out to deep center. Two outs. David Ortiz walked and was pinch run for by Joey Gathright. JD Drew singled and Gathright took second. Jed Lowrie singled to load the bases. Nick Green seemed to strike out twice (once swinging and once looking) but drew a walk and re-tied the game. And then Alex Gonzalez blooped one to left and the Red Sox won.

They didn't win the worst game of September but it wasn't a particularly badly played game. On September 25 in New York, Jon Lester took a line drive off the quadriceps muscle and as he lie on the ground rolling around in pain it didn't look good.

October: They played four games against Cleveland in October and won all of them so they were all pretty good. On October 1, though, Lester was perfect for five and one third of an inning in his first game back from being hit in New York.

As for a bad game, Clay Buchholz didn't look good in his last start on October 4. He went three innings and gave up six runs (including walking in a run).

And the play-offs aren't particularly worth talking about. The starting pitching wasn't all that bad but the bullpen and the lack of hitting was pathetic.

Hopefully, there are bigger and better things awaiting the Red Sox in 2010.