WEEKEND IN REVIEW

I should have written more this weekend, but I guess since it was the start of vacation, I took advantage of it. But I can't not comment on the great week the Mets had last week, so I'll start with that:

Sure, it would have been nice had the Mets swept the Phillies and won on Sunday night. But even in losing, they sent the Phillies a message, I think. The way the Mets and Phillies were playing each other at the end of last year, had the Phillies gone up 4-0 like they did Sunday night, the game would have been over. The fact that the Mets came back to tie Sunday night's game at 4, before losing 5-4, was a good sign, I think. And the Mets had created some pad for themselves, so a loss wasn't the worst thing, by winning five games in a row leading up to Sunday night.

Again, a sweep would have been great...but the positive thing to come out of that weekend series in Philadelphia is that the Phillies don't scare me (again - after scaring me for a couple of months last year).

MEANWHILE: When the Texas Rangers look back on the disappointment that will turn out to be the 2008 season, all they need to look back at is this four-game series in Boston as to where everything fell apart. It didn't fall apart for them so much as it came together for the Red Sox - but it certainly was at the Rangers' expense.

Boston bookended the four-game series with two whoopings - an 11-3 win on Friday, and an 8-3 win on Monday. It was the two middle games that did the most damage, though:

In innings 1-7 of both games, the Rangers trailed for only a half-inning. Then in both games, in the 8th, the Red Sox torched the Rangers bullpen and ended up winning.

Yes, the Red Sox are the better team, and should have won the games...but the way they won them will kill the Rangers' season.

One more thing about the Sox - I didn't see the Kyle Farnsworth incident last week, where he threw behind Manny Ramirez's head, but allow me this comment...not even on the pitch, really. But kind of related. Of all the years to throw behind Ramirez, this seems like an odd choice - sure, he's been beating teams with his bat, but he hasn't been showboating. I haven't ever seen Ramirez run as fast as he's run around the bases this year (instead of home run trots, started off by watching every second of the ball's flight). Then there was a pure hustle triple a couple of weeks ago. He's playing hard. And to top it off - when asked about the Farnsworth suspension, he was quite coherent, actually saying something to the effect of, "He's just doing his job." What have the Red Sox done with Ramirez?