The Stockings continue to slide!

Not even a cloud of dust from a muffed bag-burgling can obscure the fact that the Red Stockings are in the midst of a base-ball cataclysm. For even those upstarts from the Tejas Territories hosted the Red Stockings and kept the Boston heroes from tallying more than a small child's handful of aces on the board.

Back at the emerald-hued confines of the Fens is sure to do a body good beginning to-morrow eve, as the Home Towners take on the Birds from Baltimore. And in the dug-out there are sure to be some new faces, with General Manager Theodore "Boy Wonder" Epstein coming out aces in a series of backroom shenanigans with two National League squads.

And alas, it is good-bye to our stone-fisted between sacker, Mr. Julio "High Pockets" Lugo. May your britches always be uncommonly hitched upon your lithe frame, and let the breezy winds of St. Louis turn your stern countenance into one of mirth and child-like wonder.

The Curious Case of High-Pockets Lugo

When I awoke this morning with a woolly mouth, I could not decide if it was from all the lager and whiskey I quaffed last evening, or the bitter aftertaste of another shoddy performance by our beleaguered between-sacker, High-Pockets Lugo.

Rooters once again groaned as Ol' High-Pockets failed to contain a routine grasser. The play appeared to be a frame-ending "out" wrapped up in bows and ribbons. Instead, the pill tumbled past his feeble reach and plated one "run." The failure also allowed the Texans continued swatting, whereby bats-man Kinsler showed his appreciation for the additional swings by depositing the orb over the fences.

Hurler "Nickles" Penny took the gentleman's position following the contest, and declined to assign blame to his short-stop. But fellow scribblers and keyboard-clatterers have sharpened their nibs and begun executing High-Pockets by 1,000 pricks.

What to make of this enigma that is Lugo? Base-ball arithmaticians decry his reduced "range" -- and indeed, this once fleet-footed bag burgler now seems a one-man molasses flood on the diamond.

Is he still feeling the effects of surgery for Water on the Knee?

Did his much-touted work with the medicine ball during the winter months create too much bulk on his wiry frame?

Perhaps an excess of zinc in his diet has unbalanced his body humours?

Whatever the cause, the club must find a solution before High-Pockets' increasingly erratic play puts another check in the loss column.

Injured before the battle starts

Every good general knows not to put the troops in danger in advance of a campaign. Yet two of our fellas from the dirt ring -- second sacker Lil' Hands Pedroia and between-sacker Julio "High Pockets" Lugo -- have been afflicted by muscle strains and other assorted maladies.

What gives, Skipper? Have you been putting the lads through their paces in a too-accelerated manner? For instance, is High Pockets' water-on-the-knee the result of too many "jumping jacks"? Several prominent sporting physicians have declared such calisthenics too impactful on a man's joints, yet our Skipper insists on the merits of stand-in-place exercises.

Perhaps this infernal World-wide Baseball Consortium tournament is to blame for Lil' Hands' strain to his sidewall. It certainly makes sense that the rambunctious rabble-rouser, ol' number one-five, would exert himself to the straining point to show the international sides the true depth of our base-ball league's Most Vaunted Player.

All's well that ends well, we hope, as Monday broke with news that the setbacks may not threaten our dirt-ring dandies. In fact, Lil' Hands seems positively sure his sidewall is in fine fettle.

A brief pause, and the campaign continues.

The Physician’s Best Friends

Monitoring the clouting progress and hurling proficiency of our Bostons is one of the delights of spring base ball training. Less delightful is the need to recount the ongoing maladies of those players who don the hospital gown more often than the team flannels.

To wit: “Ol’ Aches and Pains” Drew seems unable to shake the dreaded lumbago that has afflicted him throughout the lushing season. Reports issued today indicate the hobbled out-fielder chugged north via steam locomotive for a meeting with spine specialists, who administered syringe-cure directly to the afflicted portions of his backbone.

For corn’s sake! At this rate, the brittle baller will have more pricks than a seamstress’s pin cushion before they’ve hung the Opening Day Bunting on Fenway’s Green edifice!

And what of our hapless short-stop “High Pockets” Lugo? Seems he’s once again looking peaked, blaming his condition on poisoned victuals! The Dominican’s delicate gut requires a steady drip of anti-fogmatics (Duffy’s, we presume) and filtered spring waters. If he’s not looking well soon, he’s sure to un-do all the muscular conditioning achieved through his rigorous sessions with the medicine-ball.

Note to team staff: Please determine whether one Mary Mallon is employed as High Pockets’ personal chef. In the interim, keep “Square Face” Lowrie on a diet of Graham Crackers and Ginger beer. We can’t afford two sickly scarecrows in the all-important position between the sacks.

Play ball!

Rooters: Sharpen your pencil-leads and prepare your score-cards!

To-day, at last, the Red Stockings begin exhibition contests under the Florida sun. Their first opponents are that fine, hale bunch of lettermen from Boston College, seen above in a studio photograph. These lads are sure to be awestruck from simply sharing a diamond with their professional balling heroes.

But for myself and Hurdy Chadwick, the afternoon's drama shall not be found in the accumulation of "runs" and "outs." Instead, we intend to scrutinize the action for tantalizing portents of the season's fate.

- Will "High Pockets" Lugo begin demonstrating his case for the starting short-stop role when he first toes the dirt of the batter's box?

- How will hometown hero Rocco "The Woonsocket Rocket" Baldelli overcome the mysterious nerve condition that prevented him from participating in regular contests last year?

- Can our aggregation of veteran and yannigan hurlers command the pill with vim and determination -- especially the fallen-angel of the staff, "Beanpole" Buchholz?

The time for idle speculation and academic debate is over. Deeds on the diamond will provide the answers we've long awaited. Huzzah!

Alas, the mid-day contest is not being carried on the wireless. However, a syndicate of newspaper men have apparently commandeered a disused ticker-tape device from a renowned industrialist recently ruined in the Bank Panic of '09. They've adapted the machine to receive telegraph updates from sideline reporters, and will dutifully recount the action through the miracle of modern electronics.

What a time to be alive!

Who will man between the sacks?

In this spring-time training season, there is one competitive question humming around the Fort Myer's practicing grounds: What mitten-wielder will man the stretch of infield dirt between the second and third sacks?

Will it be Julio "Highpockets" Lugo, the composed and genial gent whose glove is more decent than his noodle bat?

Or will Jed "Square Face" Lowrie step to the challenge and retain his roster position from last season?

At this point, the outcome of the competition will be anyone's guess. But Hurdy Chadwick, for one, believes it will do Highpockets a world of good to pit mitten against mitten, and ash stick against ash stick, to prove he still has the mettle for the job.

Go get 'em, heroes in flannel!

Bring back our Colossus

The recent epidemic of ineffectual swatting has worked my patience to its limits. “High-Pockets” Lugo stands at the dish with the countenance of a street urchin caught in the path of trolley car. Capt. Varitek swings as if underwater. And Coco “The Brawler” Crisp appears to be suffering ill effects from his recent tussle with half of the Tampas. How else to explain his inability to square ash to horsehide with any effect?

Even The Wonder is afflicted with some variation of the swat-sapping disease (despite knocking the pill for a deciding “run” last evening). That so many are failing so spectacularly at their batting duties makes us ache for the return of our Colossus -- the Mighty Ortiz, the one with the fists as big as hams.

Reports that he’s facing live hurlers again -- albeit in pre-match warm-up swatting -- are heartening. We can only hope his recovery continues apace, so he can bring his great and terrible clouting back to the diamond in time to help the Bostons capture another American League pennant.

Vexed by our vim-less Bostons!

The calendar turns, the midpoint of the base-ball contesting season is behind us, and Rooters are sorely discomfited at the penultimate position of our local nine. Playing “runners-up” to the belligerent Tampas is unbecoming of a champion squad.

To-night, it is time for heavy batting, artful catching, and deft twirling to record another victory to the Bostons’ credit. Let us see our mighty swat artists bat the journeyman Garza all over the field. And let “Knuckles” Wakefield, a veterans’ veteran and true gentleman of the sport, atone for “High-Pockets” Lugo’s unconscionable “gag” at the plate last evening, when the equalizing runner was a mere one bag from home.

To be sure, Knuckles may be the only Boston who prefers playing amongst the miasmas of the Tampa sporting gymnasium. Somehow, the ill-humors of that wretched affront to the pure and platonic beauties of a ball-park have the opposite effect on his fluttering twirls, helping him notch nine “wins” while only a single “loss” under its roof.

So lead on, Knuckles, and carry your squad back to glory.

A Win For the Ages!

To the base-ball gods, the Boston Rooters salute and lay down their appreciations for such a well-played match!

The night's gamer had in the home half of the scoreboard the Cleveland squad, whom the Bostons bested in last year's Championship Series after losing three games and winning but one. Twirler Jake Westbrook pitched for the natives, while Jon "Seattle Slop" Lester took the riser for the visitors. Neither delivered the pill effectively, though Westbrook emerged from near-scrapes in many innings, including the first. Old Seattle Slop varied his delivery, but fooled few of the opposers.

Indeed, the match seemed lost for the Bostons after Seattle Slop hucked mush-ball after mush-ball at the natives, allowing multiple home-team runners to stamp on the final base in consecutive chapters. Fortunes happy, however, as Julian "Tele-phone" Taverez ponied up to the challenge of his rivals, eliminating three consecutive lumbermen with three strikes apiece. In all, he knocked down four men in two-and-two-thirds innings. Huzzah, Tele-phone!

But with a two-notch deficit, the visitors had no quit in their eyes. The Beard For the Ages stirred trouble in the eighth inning with a decisive full circuit clout. The ball skyed into the chill of the evening and landed earthbound into a crowd packed at the left field concessionaire. Alas, that plating was all that would occur in that frame.

But into the final inning of the evening, when all was at its most dire, Julio Lugo led off the frame with a taunting double-bagger off the home-team closer, Joe "Soapy" Borowski. What followed was base-ball at its best: A run manufactured by bunt and sky fly ball, the latter walloped by the diminutive Dustin "Spats" Pedroia.

A "tie" game!

But not for long, as the Collossus improved his average with the second of the evening's two base knocks, and The Wonder stepped up to the plate and smacked a drive that could favorably be compared to the Great Pyramids, the Hanging Towers of Babylon or the Cable Cars of San-Francisco, California! In fashion of The Wonder, he rounded the bases with jazz hands flapping, a game-ending sight to see for the Rooters who had steamed to Cleveland to glee with the Old Town Team!

A tonic for sciatica

A scourge is wreaking as much havoc with ball-players in Fort Myers as saxophone music is with youngsters. That scourge? Sciatica and back numb-ness! Noted hurler Joshua P. Beckett has succumbed to the aches, and the high-waisted Julio "High Pockets" Lugo has kept from the base-paths in hopes of curing his lingering lumbago.

What of the cause? Could those bad-luck rascals, the Minnesotas, be blamed for elevating the hoopla of the Mayor's Cup? Or Dancin' Jonny Papelbon waging a war with front-office execs over his perquisite post-game steaks at Frank Giuffrida's Hilltop Beef Barn?

Methinks it's all the work with the medicine ball. The solution? Bring on the corpulent one, El Gordo!