Blooper Reel.

The Globe put together a blooper reel of sorts from picture day. A couple of notes: Josh Beckett may have a very dry sense of humor. Jon Lester is thrilled, THRILLED, to wish you a happy Fourth of July. And JD Drew is either madly in love with his hat or was suffering from hat head. (I'd vote for hat head.)

Your Cheatin Heart.

You can't really blame John Lackey. Huge smile, giant hugs, David Ortiz is irresistible. The sooner Josh Beckett comes to gripes with that the better.

BFF.

It's been awhile since I've made fun of Josh Beckett. I kind of miss it. Where, oh where, is my surly, monotonous, one-word answering kitten? He would have been good at Chris Collins' game. This Josh Beckett is almost approachable; still scary--I still wouldn't tease him about the strands of gray in that awful beard or Wake being able to help him out with that--but almost approachable.

Interestingly, in the couple of days he's known John Lackey they've apparently really clicked. According to Beckett, they're like total besties now. He also has strange looking knees.

New Wheels.

I have an aunt who used to live in Daytona Beach, Florida. She much preferred Bike Week to the Daytona 500 but since the race is tomorrow and there's a connection between the race and the Sox, we'll talk about that. Forewarning: I don't know much about cars. I'm not particularly interested in cars. And I know even less about car racing.

Hanging out in the pit of Roush Fenway Racing Group's driver Greg Biffle today was our very own Josh Beckett. Beckett stopped by the race on his way to Fort Myers. Alright, so the soundbites he gave don't make much sense but there is an interesting little bit of information revealed. Beckett styles himself as a cowboy: He's got the boots and the hat. He's got the ranch. (Does it count as a ranch if it's used for killing animals and not for raising them?) And he's got the hunting-thing down. But, during the winter, he bought himself a very un-cowboy-like, terribly-inappropriate-for-the scrubby-land-outside-San-Antonio car in the form of a Ferrari California.

It is a spiffy looking car. Impractical but spiffy.

Print the Legend.

I love movies: new movies, old movies, comedies, thrillers, Westerns, dramas, horror flicks, foreign films, blockbusters, little indie films, kids movies. I'll happily watch them all in search of a good story. I love a good story. (Craig Breslow? Good story.) If there is nothing to watch on television, then you can bet that one of the first places I'll stop with the remote is TCM. You can run into some wonderful stories by just leaving TCM on--that's how I saw Bringing Up Baby, an absolute hoot of a movie. [Aside: Incidentally, I get a very Cary Grant vibe from Mike Lowell.]

One of the best story-tellers (and a New England boy to boot) was John Ford. In 1962 he made a movie called The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance about, essentially, truth and the value of it. It's a good movie even if that stupid song does get stuck in my head. The most famous quote from the film is: "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." That's where my mind goes after it stops singing about how "He was the greatest of them all."

Josh Beckett, on the other hand, must be a big fan of the movie because his mind doesn't stop there. He goes to Doniphon (John Wayne) telling Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart): "Out here a man settles his own problems." [Context: Jimmy Stewart plays a young Eastern lawyer who goes out West hoping to civilize them via the law and John Wayne plays a rancher who reluctantly helps him out.]

To wit: Available on December 1, you can purchase a t-shirt with the quote from Muze Clothing that will help support the Josh Beckett Foundation.

A Hunting We Will Go.

Betty Boop - A Hunting We Will Go
by baje22

I am not morally opposed to hunting. I don't particularly understand it's appeal but I'm not against it.

So even though I don't recall having ever seen a Betty Boop cartoon, I was never really a fan of Ms. Boop. (My Dad's nickname for me is descended from Ms. Boop's and it greatly offended my childhood sensibilities to be named after a cartoon character. My grandfather always used to call me Betty and my Dad picked up on that and calls me Booper, or in its full version: Betty Booper Pooper Scooper. It was never a favorite of mine.) She seems to be a bit of a flake. In this cartoon, she will just absolutely die if she doesn't get a fur coat but then the sight of the animals without their fur causes her to see the light and she gives them back their coats. Because skinning animals alive is wrong. Or something.

Hopefully, Josh Beckett has properly vetted the participants in his charity hunting event this weekend (You knew that there would be a point in here somewhere, right? And that really was the only mention I could find of the gathering--a throw away line in an article about philanthropic Tommy Hunter.) so that he hasn't invited any individuals who might share Ms. Boop's ideals. I'd bet she's a trouble maker.

Different Strokes.

A couple of nights ago Jacoby Ellsbury was spotted whooping it up at Rain nightclub in the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas--which is where Real World Las Vegas was based. (Don't judge me.) It was the night of John McCain's daughter's birthday party but it seems as if Ellsbury's appearance, his dance floor adjacent table, and his vodka cocktails were merely incidental and that he wasn't part of the big do.

Meanwhile down in Texas, Josh Beckett will be playing in Vernon Wells' Charity golf tournament on November 2. The tournament is meant to raise money for the Vernon Wells Perfect 10 foundation. I'm not entirely certain but it seems that the foundation works to help homeless children in the Arlington, TX area.

Scenes from LA.

AP photos from yesterday's and today's workouts in LA:



No, Papi! No! Baseball gloves aren't for eating.



David Ortiz: Hey! I play first base too. Can I come practice with you guys?
Victor and Youkilis try not to laugh.



Pedroia: Nu-unh, Mr. Beckett. It wasn't me who stole your glove. I swear. It was...Jed. Jed way over there that did it. Honest.




Pedroia thinks: You know, if this whole baseball thing doesn't end up working out. I could have a kick ass career as a smoldering underwear model.




At least Daisuke Matsuzaka thinks I'm funny.

Pin Pals.

Say what you will about Josh Beckett (and I may have said it all) being taciturn and surly, he really does seem to care about the success of Beckett Bowl and helping out Children's hospital. I'm not sure I've ever heard him string together that many words at a time.

Josh and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Game.

I know that in some circles Josh Beckett is somewhat of a sacred cow but that was bad. Really bad. Really, really bad. Five home runs? Two bad starts in a row?

Josh, kitten, if you were going to have such an awful game, couldn't you have had the decency to not do it during an ESPN game? When the Sox fail on NESN, Don sounds disappointed. When they fail on ESPN, Joe Morgan is positvely beside himself with joy. Blech.

You Should Be Beckett.

First things first: Josh, kitten, did you buy that shirt in 1976? Because paired with some white polyester bell-bottomed trousers, it would be the perfect leisure suit. You could kick it with the Bee Gees.

And since I don't want to be someone who uses this space simply to whine about faults the team has on any given night (and really they should have been able to score more runs than the did), I'll just say that while Beckett may not have been at his absolute best, he was sufficient. And that's all they can ask of him. They had a little bit of offense going and they had some nice defense as well. So that was all good.

And Craig Breslow did well, so that's a bonus.

Happy Thoughts.

Seriously? That was crap. You might argue that the offense should have been able to come up with something more than two runs; that would've been fabulous. Or you might point out that while I was watching him get ready to pitch I was suddenly reminded of the migraine issue. But I don't care. While I'm generally for spreading the blame around, I'm perfectly happy to put this one squarely in Papelbon's lap. Dude doesn't suck, but that did. Rather than stress about it though, I present someone's photo of a kitten (who pitched very well) and a puppy. Also, I don't know that I've ever been so mad at Alex Cora. Screw you, Alex Cora. I inexplicably liked you.

Chesire Cat.

One of the guys I work with has, for some reason, decided that I am madly in love with Josh Beckett. It's very, very strange because anyone who knew me would know that that's not the case but he's fixated on this idea and has been running with it for a couple of years. In the vein of having to prove that my fandom extends beyond trying to land myself a ballplayer, I mostly try to ignore him.

But this little video is enough to soften even my steely heart. Josh Beckett's foundation donated a recovery room for the oncology unit to Boston Children's Hospital. He seems genuinely pleased with being able to help. And a joke or two from Josh Beckett! That, in and of itself, is pretty exciting.

Kitten Being Caring.

Yesterday afternoon Josh Beckett faced eighteen Minnesota Twins. He struck out three and walked one. He gave up three runs on six squibby little hits. Yesterday evening he threw for a different purpose, before an entirely different audience, and his catcher was eight years old.

Tuesday night Josh Beckett threw the ceremonial first pitch at the dedication of a little league field in Bonita Springs, Florida. The field was being dedicated to a seven-year old little leaguer, Ryan Lucier, who died from viral myocarditis. Beckett learned about the kiddo, who was a Red Sox fan, from his father at the charity golf tournament back in February.

According to his father (probably), the kiddo's favorite thing to say was: "Red Sox rule, Yankees drool." Damn right, kid.

Kitten Fishing.

Comcast Sports has a nice little interview with Josh Beckett. He comes across as very thoughtful and almost gentle. He does say something odd about alligators and hummingbirds but it's a different side to Beckett. Plus, he lets the fish go.

Kitten on the Mound.

Just can't wait for baseball? How about six outs from Josh Beckett from earlier today?

Mmmmm, Pie.

(A little love for Worcester.)

I would hate to have to try to interview Josh Beckett; getting him to say anything even the slightest bit interesting seems to be like pulling teeth. But, apparently, Tony Massarotti knows the way to get him to open up.

Today, Massarotti asked him when he starts preparing for the season and Beckett replied:

"We usually start the day after Thanksgiving. Have a nice little Thanksgiving meal with some pie and everything and then start working out the next day."

Pie! Josh Beckett likes pie. I'm not a big fan of pie myself but the fact that I know some little trivial thing about him makes me glad.

Ay Caramba!

So, I'm just going to go ahead and guess that Josh Beckett didn't win his school's geography bee.

Leaving on a Jet Plane.

Leaving Fenway, Josh Beckett dons a snappy pin-striped suit:

Pedroia pulls off a tan and mint green combination(while wife Kelli goes with a drab gray sweater dress, matching gray boots that are too big and don't have a heel, and an over-sized black bag):

But Papelbon? Papelbon chooses the always classic look of an untucked white shirt and jeans:

XYZ.

Oh, Josh. Kitten.

When one pitches as well as you did last night, one (meaning me) hates to nitpick; however, when one (meaning you) is about to step onto a baseball field in front of thousands of people, in your home state of Texas, with thousands more people watching from home, and have their picture taken by Reuters, one should always remember to check their zipper first.