And what is this love affair with Aaron Cook, anyhow? It can’t possibly be based on any rational evaluations of his performance. Boston media had been recklessly hyping his AAA performance as some unavoidable elephant in the room – and yet everything about his performance at AAA was pedestrian except his ERA. Oooohh, look at the nice shiny ERA. We can’t let this guy get away!

His Sinker was 85% of the pitches he threw yesterday and just 56% of them for Strikes. Look it up.

He threw 3 Fastballs, 2 Curves and 2 sliders. If you are gonna throw any pitch 85% of the time, it better be a plus plus pitch. Cook’s sinker is no where near that good.

Here is Cook’s total standard stats over the previous two seasons:

9-18, 40 Starts, 5.39 ERA, 88K’s/89BBs, 1/1 K/BB ratio, 270 Hits in 223 1/3IP, 1.61 WHIP

Tell me . . . what exactly about those numbers, screams “Give me a start in the AL East?”

His K/BB ratio is less than 1-1.

Last week I listened in sheer horror as a host on one of the PR partners of the Red Sox, their flagship radio station WEEI, attempted to scare the audience into believing that if Cook walked, the Yankees would scoop him up. We should only be so lucky! And while the Yankees have struggled with their pitching decisions in recent years, they aren’t that inept.

Does he have some value as a middle reliever? Perhaps. But again, given the numbers I posted above, why bother? Should he quit and go home? That’s a question only he can answer for himself.

My thing is this . . . are we better off with a guy in long relief who’s career appears to be no longer as a Major League Starting Pitcher . . . at least not in the AL East . . . or with a younger hurler with upside, whose development could benefit from the experience gained in the middle innings against MLB hitters?

The only way Davis would be able to cut Cook’s knee in that location is if Davis was sliding directly AT Cook, head on — not from his right side as is pictured. Further, since Cook’s shins were face down toward the ground during his silly slide, how would Davis’ cleat have gotten under the leg, facing up in such a way to as to create a cut just beneath the knee?

Who gave me the thumb down? Come out of hiding and make your case that Cook DOESN’T stink.

I’ve already posted at length, with numbers to back up my argument that Aaron Cook should never get a start in the American League East.

So bring it on.

This start was a bad idea. Almost anyone else would have given them a better chance to win this game.

What was most surprising was they gave the Sox 5 minutes or so to patch him up. That part of the leg doesn’t bleed too much(my daughter cut that part of her leg that required over 200 stitches with little blood)