Can You Feel The Energy?

There's a lot of good chi flowing out in Red Sox spring training camp in Fort Myers. Players are showing up healthy and in high spirits, ready to get this 2011 season underway. Adrian Gonzalez is starting to swing a bat well ahead of schedule. Youk's been swinging like the thumb injury that ended his season last August never happened. Pedey's foot's holding up just fine and his mouth hasn't skipped a beat. Tek and Salty are like peas and carrots. Carl Crawford is predicting 6-year-old D'Angelo "Little Papi" Ortiz's rise to YouTube stardom as the heir apparent to Batting Stance Guy. Oh, and Beckett's predicting triple-digit wins for the Sox this season. Optimism is high and the team is hungry to put the injurious 2010 season behind them.

So, can this team live up to all the expectations, both the fans' and their own? It certainly has the talent to be a scary-good team. The lineup, whose loss of V-Mart and Beltre were more than offset by the acquisition of Crawford and Gonzalez, is very deep, if lefty-heavy. The lefty load can be mitigated against left-handed pitching with righties Mike Cameron and Darnell McDonald in the outfield and switch-hitter (and lefty-killer) Jed Lowrie in the infield. Lowrie is ultra-versatile in the infield--he can play all four positions. Likewise, Cameron and McDonald can both play all three outfield positions.

Now, what about the pitching? The men on the mound were part of the problem last year, both in the back end of the rotation and in the bullpen. While the rotation is the same: Lester, Buchholz, Beckett, Lackey, Dice-K, the bullpen has been revamped, with Bobby Jenks changing his White Sox to red and Dan Wheeler joining his former Rays teammate Crawford in trading the dome for the Green Monster. Papelbon remains the closer, hoping to rebound from a shaky season where he blew 8 saves and Bard gets help from Jenks and possibly Wheeler as well in the setup role. Okajima and Rich Hill are among the lefties vying for a slot in the pen, with Wake, Aceves, and Doubront in the mix for long relief/spot starts. Curt Young brings a new perspective to the Sox staff, and, seeing how strong the Oakland staff was last year, that could be a very good thing.

There is plenty of reason to be optimistic about the 2011 Red Sox season. It looks to be an exciting one that could resemble 2007 a lot more than 2010. Baseball is unpredictable and we know too well what crazy things can go on over the course of the season, like laser shows off the foot, freak thumb injuries, charging third basemen, mono, AT&T Park, among other potential calamities. One thing the Red Sox can be sure about is that, as a team, they are heading in the right direction.