The Final, Fatal Flaw Well, welcome to the first intentional walk of the 2006 Red Sox season. (author's note: I wrote this long before I clicked over to see Shaughnessy's effing headline. Proof of this is a convo I had with a longtime TLBR supporter prior to even getting to a computer. Moral of the story: I'm at least as creative as that curly red-headed Holy Cross educated p.o.s.)

Except this time, an opposing pitcher isn't tossing four off-speed, off-location pitches to his catcher. It's the G.M. who put the four-fingers down for a sign, stood up, grabbed his stuff, and walked.

Oh, but don't worry, I'm sure Thursday the aforementioned columnist from the Globe will have some story about how Theo Epstein thought Yaz was an asshole, or how he wore pinstriped pajamas, or had a secret crush on Don Mattingly. Maybe Theo was to blame for the Pats' 3-3 record before Sunday night.

Either way, the Red Sox have a few battles to fight now: in the press, on their roster, and in their offices. I wonder which one will get the bloodiest.

But the bottom line is this: it didn't have to get to this point. But, thanks to the good work (did you sense that sarcasm?) by Larry Lucchino and the rest of the Sox crack p.r. driven front office, a bright young baseball mind and his staff of equally adept assistants have looted all the copy paper boxes in the Fenway office supply room to use to pack up their desks.

Oh well, onto 2006...and whatever effing slogan they're going to jam down our throats. Maybe they'll sell broken shards of the .406 Club as an effort to remind Sox fans that "We're Rebuilding in 2006!"

Ugh. Thanks beautiful.
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More on (moron?) Shaughnessy...god I've already given this prick three namedrops in how much space so far today?

I broke my own personal embargo on reading his stuff today, just to see what the propaganda arm of the Sox would have to say.

And I found this. And it only bolsters my (low) opinion of him:

"Late last week, it was pretty clear that Epstein's contract negotiation was coming to full boil. It seemed that the parties were getting close, and after much haggling about money and power, they were ready to announce a deal. I left messages with both parties Friday and that night they made a joint call to my home, insisting (on the record) that they were in radio silence and would have an announcement probably early this week.

Off the record, there was quite a bit of conversation, and it seemed genuine and convivial. Epstein and Lucchino talked about mutual respect and working out differences and both indicated there probably would be a positive resolution Monday. Theo even made a joke about cleaning out his desk and Larry made a joke about Theo thinking he was Henny Youngman."

Ok...I know he did not detail the particulars of the off-the-record comments. But he paraphrased them. Hell, the fact he even referenced them is borderline wrong. (at least no one alleged "shaving points" off-the-record. whoops, that was unfortunate...)

And just a few paragraphs earlier, Shaughnessy arrogantly thumped his chest with the "if you want to blame me, fine."

Fine.

I will.
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This stuff - and granted, if you work in Boston and for the Red Sox, you pay dearly for that big White House...or in this case, that big Green Wall - but if there's a radio silence going (in public at least), then it ought to remain that way. That's no matter if off-the-record (which we all know is like a unicorn: something that's nice to believe in, but doesn't really exist) or not.

The latest fad to come out of Yawkey Way is the notion of privacy. Not a new theme, not something terribly taxing either. Players and staff can't even go out to Store 24 to buy a Gatorade without people hounding them. I know how this is; I've been one of "those guys" before. Call it maturity or something, but I've moved on from that. Many haven't. And that stinks.

But, in a way, it is to be expected in public. In private, it's not. There is a line. You can't govern the fans in Applebee's, bugging Trot Nixon or Tim Wakefield while they're trying the cabo chicken salad. You CAN within the negotiating room and the internal conference calls.

And if the parties most directly involved on the private side don't seem to recognize that or know quite what it means to keep things under wraps, then how can you trust them on every other seemingly more complicated issue?

Answer: you can't.
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Be sure to click over to Scott's Shots, Chad Finn and Sheriff Sully's sites - the links are on the right side - for great perspective on the mess in the Hub.

Dave Scott gets after it, as always, and will hopefully be the one to bring this down. A veritable Woodward and Bernstein (closer to Bernstein, though) among the Boston sports media critics.

Sully makes a great point, which rides in the sidecar to my Shaughnessy/Globe stuff above: you have to feel for Gordon Edes and Chris Snow. It's not their fault that their paper is in cahoots and they get trumped on, arguably, the biggest story in Boston sports since, well, the shampooing World Series win. Finn, as usual, hits the nail squarely on the head. Click on over.
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Allow me a moment to put on my delusional cap: Things are looking up!

My dream job is open, I'm sending in a resume...and then this tasty tidbit from the NY Post's Page Six: Leonardo DiCaprio and Gisele Bundchen, after dating for several years, have called it quits for good.

Dream job...dream girl...all in 12 hours. I'd better sharpen the C.V. and start doing about 125,000 crunches.

Yeah right. You wanna talk about privacy issues then...
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One.  ¶ 11:12 AM