Red Sox Had 'Manny' Issues

Manny Ramirez has taken all the blame for the recent Red Sox woes on the field and he deserves a large chunk of the blame, but certainly not all of it. Manny has slowly fallen out of favor with Red Sox management, and as of last weekend Boston management decided they were done with Manny being Manny. Some of his teammates did become fed up with his antics to the point they approached GM Theo Epstein and asked he be moved. The Red Sox did just that, and landed Pirates OF Jason Bay to fill the void in left field. The Red Sox players have been blaming Manny for their recent play, but I can assure you he was not the biggest problem. First off, Manny does not pitch. The Boston pitching as of late besides Jon Lester, Jonathan Papelbon, and Justin Masterson has been down right awful. The ace Josh Beckett fell to 9-8 on the year after getting pounded by the Angels. Dice-K seems to walk six batters every outing and only lasts 5 innings, Clay Buchholz has been awful since bein! g recalled from Triple-A, and the bullpen has been absolutely pathetic. Manny has nothing to do with any of that. Jason Varitek cannot put the ball in play anymore. This guy has lost his hitting touch so quickly and Manny had nothing to do with that. Mike Lowell, JD Drew, Jacoby Ellsbury, Coco Crisp, and Kevin Youkilis have all seen their numbers drop over the past few weeks and Manny had nothing to do with that. Dustin Pedroia seems to be the only guy hitting and he is on absolute fire. David Ortiz just returned from injury, but the Red Sox are 1-5 since he has returned. Manny Ramirez has been Boston's #1 excuse for everything that has gone wrong. He is now gone and Boston must play blame game with someone else. If Manny was so problematic that it caused Boston to get swept by the Angels twice and lose two out of three to NY, then prove it by winning again. Lets look at the facts, the Angels are now a powerhouse and wanted to win all six of those games a lot more! than Boston did, NY has been a desperate team and wanted that! series at Fenway more than the BoSox, and the Red Sox as a whole have played downright awful baseball as of late as a team. David Ortiz will suffer without Manny Ramirez. He will not get many pitches he wants and the walks will be plentiful. When Ramirez was out the last month of the 2006 season, Ortiz was walked a ton and his numbers decreased without Ramirez. AL clubhouses are rejoicing everywhere with Manny headed to the NL. The Yankees have stated they felt a huge sigh of relief after he was dealt, and said jokingly they would pay Manny's contract to get him out of Boston. If you want to play blame game, why doesn't each and every player hold themselves partially accountable rather than pin it on the easiest target which was disgruntled Manny Ramirez. Boston is by no means dead in the AL East pennant race, they just have a lot of work to do and everyone must pick up the large amount of slack left by the best clutch right-handed hitter of our era in #24 Manny Ramirez.