I get it, people need an explanation. But it’s a load of hogwash. Did you know the Braves collapsed too? They gave up quite a big lead too. Why’s that, dapperdan? Were they chugging beers too?

Just accept that pitchers will struggle sometimes. Yes, at times, even two, three or four starts in a row. (Or, for the more dramatic among us; “AN ENTIRE MONTH?!?!”) Too bad for the Sox, it were their two only decent starters that struggled and they had no depth at all to pick up the slack. But please, do me a favour, don’t act as if beer had anything to do with it.

I truly believe that these pitchers had an attitude problem and lost their edge, their motivation, and their support of the team. Their pre-adolescent sneaking around to engage in the ‘illicit’ drinking group is evidence of this problem.

For a pitcher to have a sub-3.00 ERA (closer to 2.00 or less—Beckett and Lester were that good) for most of the season and then blow up to 6 or 7 for a month or more is potentially troubling, but not all that uncommon. But when this drop-off seems to hit several pitchers in unison, you really have to wonder—and hopefully find out—what might be going on beyond a single injury or change in mechanics.

Now it appears it is really the act of drinking, in itself, that is a problem? Jeez… Let’s face it, anyone up in arms about this is just a damn hypocrite.

The ‘move’ from clubhouse to dugout also raises more doubts in my mind about whether it is conceivable that teammates or coaches actually did not know what these guys are up to.

The good news is that a lot of the blame has to fall on the shoulders of Francona. I truly respect him for what he did in 8 years. I never remember him calling any player out publicly in those 8 years. Overall it’s a good thing to be so supportive to your players, but he took it to an extreme and it blew up in his face this year. I’m reasonably confident that Lucchino and Cherington will see this and hire a manager who, along with many other skills, will know when he needs to kick some butt even while mostly being a “players’ manager.”

Beckett seems more and more like an awesome guy every day.

Even though the ’86 Mets weren’t THAT long ago, that team was a walking bender…but as I’ve said, they won, so that colors our perception of them.

I’m not a prude by any stretch and I love beer, but something about this story bugs the hell out of me. This is no way for players on a modern-day baseball team to behave.

These players, all of them, need a serious wake-up call. They need to understand that their actions, no matter how innocuous, can affect the rest of their teammates…even the smallest distraction can cause issues. Man up, show some team spirit, and FFS be able to not drink for more than 4 hours at a time…cripes, am I the only one kind of disgusted about this?

Drinking in the clubhouse happened. Now, in the dugout? How does that excuse their little group from scrutiny? I can’t fathom thinking someone had my back when their guzzling a beer as I go out to the field. Nice teammate.

Hope they weren’t driving home. Seriously.

Edit function in ’012 and a new back up band!

Only 3 kind of people are in the dugout corridor during games . . . security, trainers and clubbies.

And if they intend on keeping their jobs, none of them are too bright for flappin their choppers.

For Christ’s sake, if you get paid to write about baseball, I would rather see a sabermetric story on this site than seeing this repetitive nonsense. And that’s saying a lot because I hate sabermetrics.

86 mets anyone?
78 Yanks?
Mickey frakking Mantle?
Babe Ruth?

You think none of these guys or teams ever had a beer during a game?

Let’s all put on our big boy pants and get the shocked looks off our faces.