Red Sox: All your moneys are belong to us

The Red Sox and the Massachusetts Lottery have teamed up once again, this time for a $20 scratch ticket.

Twenty dollars.

I have never in my life walked up to the counter of a store and thought to myself you know, dropping $20 on that lottery ticket sounds like a good idea right now, but I have to admit that I might be tempted to buy one if I happen to be in a good mood at the right time, given the $10 million grand prize.

With that kind of money, you could do something that you would ordinarily consider to be financially irresponsible and out of reach. Like taking your family to see a game at Fenway, for instance.

There are also twenty $1 million prizes and 100 Red Sox road trips.

The new ticket is expected to raise $23 million in profit for the state of Massachusetts. 

Boycott averted, Red Sox headed to Japan

The Red Sox threatened to boycott the trip to Japan this morning, after learning yesterday that the coaches were not going to receive the $40,000 compensation that was expected.

So far, members of the Red Sox have made it sound like MLB was either untruthful or deceptive, hinting that money was promised and then not paid.

I have a hard time believing this, and the Globe has a more feasible explanation.

I’m thinking MLB promised they would throw a certain amount of money into the pot, the players thought it would be split up among everybody, but then found out that the coaches weren’t eligible to receive it and freaked out.

I know that MLB will take some hits for this, but kudos to them for making it right in the end. And kudos to the Red Sox for standing up for their coaches. The fluffing they’re getting on ESPN is reaching Jeter-like proportions.

Red Sox ditch Stub Hub, go with Ace Ticket

The Red Sox have decided to end their relationship with Stub Hub, and will instead use Ace Ticket as the only official resale option for season ticket holders. 

I understand that this news might seem inconsequential, but I think it could have a measurable impact on the ticket situation at Fenway by lessening the incentive to resell.

Stub Hub works a lot like Ebay, in that ticket holders set their own prices and ship directly to the buyers. Conversely, Ace Ticket buys tickets from you and then puts a premium on them when they sell them on their site. Essentially, they make the reselling business less profitable for the original ticket holders by turning them into middlemen.

Their tickets are still expensive, of course, but I’m hopeful that there will be less incentive for people to resell their tickets when it becomes less lucrative to do so.

Maybe things won’t work out this way, but it’s still nice to see the Red Sox taking action here. I didn’t think they really cared enough about the situation to change things up.

Fenway’s Coke bottles replaced by Coca-Cola corner

I was opposed to the addition of the Coke bottles in 1997, but I have to admit I’ll miss the Coke bottle shots now that they’ve been taken down.

I’m also saddened that we’ll never get to see Bartolo Colon shimmy up the pole and try to drink them.

The bottles will be replaced by a Coca-Cola sign at the top of the upper deck in left field, where 412 new seats have been added. This section will now forever be known as “Coca-Cola Corner.” See, it’s catchy because every letter starts with a ‘C.’

Boston Bed Box, anyone? 

The Coca-Cola section (or ‘neighborhood,’ as marketing likes to call it) is “family friendly,” which I assume is in reference to a no alcohol policy rather than the ticket price of $75 per seat.

Henry to Steinbrenner: Hugs, not bombs

In a brilliant display of presidential passive-aggression, John Henry responded to Hank Steinbrenner’s verbal bombs by giving him his very own certificate of sanity Red Sox Nation citizenship card.

“I’m a big Hank fan,” Henry wrote. “Just to ensure he knows how cool Red Sox Nation is, [Saturday] we officially inducted him as a member of Red Sox Nation and we are sending him his membership card giving him access to an array of options including our newsletter, bumper stickers, pins, Green Monster seats and a hat personally autographed by David Ortiz.”

Where was Remy during all this? Reading “My Pet Goat” to elementary school kids? 

Red Sox beat up college kids, take lunch money

The annual exhibition game vs. Boston College is a lot like the first week of NCAA football when all the good teams pair themselves up with terrible teams and beat them up just to build up some hype and inflate their BCS numbers.

The danger is that every now and then you lose to Appalachian State, and your team is so devastated that it never recovers.

How much would it have affected the Red Sox had they lost? Sean Casey, The Nicest Man on Earth, would have speared a kid after snapping his bat in half and throwing it like a javelin into the Boston College celebration pile.

I would have walked away from the TV shaking my head, unable to speak, likening the loss to Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS. It would be an overstatement, sure, but like a game 7, this is a game you’re not supposed to lose.

So it’s not that I wanted the Red Sox to lose. It’s just that I didn’t feel especially good about myself when I was rooting for a team that was pummeling 18-year-olds to a tune of 24-0.

Couldn’t they string a couple of hits together and get at least one run across the plate? Can we give them a 5 run handicap? I wouldn’t feel so dirty right now if that had happened.

Pulling for the Red Sox in this game when they were up by 12 was like pulling for Mr. Burns’ hired team of Major League All-Stars to win the championship softball game vs. a group of nobodies (Cut your sideburns, Mattingly).

It was like pulling for Godzilla in Bambi vs. Godzilla.

It was like rooting for the team of convicts that included Jerry Rice, Herschel Walker and Jim Kelly when they beat the snot out of the University of North Texas in Necessary Roughness.

It was like watching Fisk’s shot and hoping the ball would go foul.

What do the Red Sox get out of this? What’s the point of this tradition, beyond the cool factor for the college kids?

Red Sox to wear corporate logo on sleeves

Being in Japan for Opening Day isn’t the only thing that will be different for the Red Sox this year. They’ll also be sporting EMC logos on their sleeves.

Advertising has been an accepted part of baseball since the fastball was invented (and maybe before), but for the most part it has been kept off the field of play.

The Red Sox uniforms will feature paid advertising for the first time during the two game series in Japan. Most fans will probably take one look at the ad and think that isn’t so bad. And they’ll be right. The logo really isn’t any more obtrusive than the World Series patches teams wear in October.

A conspiracy theorist with a background in psychology and marketing could probably make a convincing argument that the World Series patches were introduced just to warm us up to the idea that it’s okay to put something on the sleeve.

Alright, I’m probably being paranoid (maybe). And yes, I agree that the patch isn’t as bad as The Great Spiderman 2 Fiasco of 2004.

The only thing that saved us from having Spidey bases for three days that year was the reaction of the fans. We hated it. We were furiously angry at the league for ruining one of the few parts of the game that hadn’t already been auctioned off to sponsors. And in the end, the sponsors pulled the plug.

Sponsors spend money on these things to attract potential customers. Not to piss them off.

If we’re willing to accept the patch for a couple games it’s not so bad, then at some point down the line we’ll probably be willing to accept it for every game. I don’t necessarily think this is a bad thing, but one thing I don’t want to see is JD Drew’s biceps brought to me by Lipitor. Ever. Please, God.

There are many reasons why I think this will happen eventually. Most of them are boring and probably unfounded. But if you have any doubts, just check out the expression on Lucchino’s face as he’s cradling the advertisement sleeve. He looks like he just became a father for the first time. The nurse is handing him the slimy kicking baby, but he sees some kind of beauty in it. He’s known the kid for three seconds, and he’s already fallen in love. Plus, think of the tax breaks!

His life will never be the same.

And neither will baseball.

Selig to reign through 2012

Baseball owners voted unanimously to give Bud Selig an extension through the 2012 season. 

Selig accepted the nomination, despite having previously stated that he would not return after the 2009 season. It’s no surprise that the owners have asked him to stick around, though. Revenues have grown from $1.6 billion to over $6 billion since Selig took control in 1992, and he’s determined to turn Major League Baseball into a global empire.

Fans have long criticized Selig’s initiatives as being strictly revenue driven, maintaining that he has been shortsighted as far as how his choices might impact the quality of the game.

He has expanded the league to include four new teams—the Marlins, Rockies, Devil Rays and Diamondbacks, bringing baseball to new markets while saturating the talent pool and introducing the mind-numbingingly awful potential to have a Tampa vs. Arizona World Series snoozer.

Selig also restructured the divisions, introduced the wild card and interleague play, developed revenue sharing, created the World Baseball Classic, ignored steroid use when it benefited him and villainized it once it didn’t.

But Selig isn’t done yet.

“By the time I leave, you won’t recognize the sport,” he said.

In what way is that a good thing?