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| Lester on Booing Papelbon: ‘It Was Uncalled For’ | 10.11.09 at 5:44 pm ET |
Red Sox starter Jon Lester admitted that he was “absolutely” surprised to hear fans booing Jonathan Papelbon after the Red Sox closer suffered a loss by allowing the first runs of his postseason career as the Sox got eliminated, 7-6, in Game 3 of the ALDS by the Angels. Papelbon entered the game with a 5-2 lead and two outs in the eighth. He allowed both inherited runners to score, and then after retiring the Angels (via a pickoff throw) in the eighth, allowed three more runs in the ninth to end his record-setting run of 26 scoreless postseason innings to start his career.
“I think [the booing] surprised everybody,” said Lester. “I don’t think he deserves for [the fans] to do that. Obviously, it wasn’t everybody. You could tell that. But the few people that did [boo him], I personally think it was uncalled for. But that’s the way it goes sometimes. Hopefully we can come back next year and do better.”
Red Sox G.M. Theo Epstein suggested that the fans were likely “booing at the situation, more than at the guy. He’s been a big part of our success. He didn’t have it today. There were a lot of frustrated people out there. I would be shocked if they were booing him, personally. They were probably booing the situation.”
14 Comments for “Lester on Booing Papelbon: ‘It Was Uncalled For’”
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October 11th, 2009 at 7:55 pm
No Red Sox fans booed Papelbon, because anyone who would boo him isn’t a fan — he’s a fraud and an idiot.
October 11th, 2009 at 7:59 pm
And I don’t mean “idiot” the way Johnny Damon meant it.
October 11th, 2009 at 8:45 pm
Papelbon blew the game today. If someone wanted to boo, then so what? These are adults and I’m sure they’ll get over it.
October 11th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
From wikipedia: “Booing performers has a very long history, possibly to the days of ancient Greece, where audiences would boo bad performances and applaud good performances.”
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Papelbon stunk today and had many “heart attack” closes all year long. Booing today was more than appropriate. He gets paid the big buck$ to save the game today and he didn’t. He failed miserably and the audience, each of whom paid a small fortune for tickets, parking and refreshments had EVERY right to express themselves however they pleased. Amazing Dan Kennedy that you want a law to allow reporters to use anonymous sources, but you bash paying fans from expressing themselves in public. Wow!
October 11th, 2009 at 9:39 pm
I agree with the crowd’s booing Pap, he underperformed this season, and his stats were misleading. His constant talk of getting his big payday has irritated me all year, and for him to even think he deserves it when he throws nothing but fastballs the entire 9th inning is just plain stupid. His stuff clearly wasn’t up to par, batters had figured him out all season (nothing but fastballs is quite predictable), and he blew one of the most important saves of his career. Had I been there, I’d have booed him too.
October 11th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
Fish: I’m pretty skeptical about a law that would protect reporters from having to identify their anonymous sources. I thought you knew that. If we’re going to have such a law, it has to protect not just presscard-carrying reporters but bloggers who are doing journalism. Try watching this:
http://www.beatthepress.org/episode/segment/592
Aside from that, I don’t see what one has to do with the other.
October 12th, 2009 at 10:30 am
To be honest, I can go both ways on this. Sure, booing Papelbon was something to do, because he underperformed throughout the season, but you just cannot place all of the blame towards Pap over this loss. Remember: The whole team batted around .150 during this 3 game stretch. Does this win you ballgames? I think not.
If I, myself, was at the game, I would not have booed Papelbon, but booed the entire team. You can’t just look at this on the surface; you have to look at this deeper, team-wise. The Sox had the pieces to contend for their 3rd championship this decade, but they were not in place.
Sure, I’m a Red Sox fan, but I don’t single out one player to place the blame on, you know? The season was already over after the first two games, given the offensive situation.
October 12th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
I hope we don’t hear anymore threats from Papelbon on how he will leave the Sox if they don’t pay him “big money” and how he will sign with the Yankees if the they fork over the dough. Bard did his job – His stuff is electric. Wagner did as well minus the Youklis botched play at first. Good pitch-off by Papelbon to end the bleeding in the 8th, but how do you walk Figgins? The guy hadn’t been on base all series. Not a good performance overall and frankly not a good performance all year by papelbon’s standards. Watching Papelbon close this year has been like watching a high-wire act with no net and yesterday he fell off.
October 12th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Hey he blew a game the sox had to win…it wouldnt have mattered who was out there anyway. They lost a game they shouldve won simple as that
October 12th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
The Boys on WEEI felt it was wrong to boooooo, But Papelbon never complains when he strikes out the side and We all Cheer?!?! The Booing(or Cheering) is for the Team! Only WEEI Radio Sports Experts would ’spin’ their way…..for a talking point. Here are some more from the Sports Station without a brain……….
More Gems from WEEI: Mike Holly “This team is built for the playoffs”…….. Hey Mike was it not the Same avg team During the Same season ?!? Mike Holly “The Best one two punch in baseball”(refering to the starting pitching). How that work out for you? 3 and 0……….. this is something, that could have been mailed in and was by Boston.
Also, the National Leauge is AAA ball…………. Really, Mike……….. Well, when the Red Sox play in the World….ohooooh, that’s right they were beaten by the weak West Div American League Champs. Oooops.
Boston spend some money and buy someone and stop these insane John Smoltz Projects………..and you wonder why you are looking up at the Yankees, again ! OMGRich !
October 12th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
His stats were misleading Stefano? Are you okay?
October 12th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Hey AJB… this isn’t fox… take your conservative political views, and leave them in your car when you come to the park.
October 13th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Team game, team loss. Paps had plenty of help in losing the series. Sox had deficiencies all year at DH, shortstop, and catcher, and had only partly remedied them by playoff time. (At best, you could only call the Sox ‘average’, for the most part, at those spots.) The Sox also hurt most of the year (except when Youk played third) with a less-than-mobile third baseman. An inability to hold runners put men in scoring position constantly, especially during the Angels’ series. Nearly every walk or single became a double, and this put undue pressure on the starters.
It’s extraordinary that the Sox made the playoffs at all this year, actually. I never thought they phoned a game in, and I want to credit them for effort all around. They have specific fixes that need to be made at the positions listed above, and this means some hard choices this off-season.
October 13th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Good – Outstanding performances ya cheer! Bad to worst performaces ya boo! So what is the problem? He stunk and he got booed. I booed the whole team the first two games as they did not play that well. So what’s the problem. When they played good to outstanding, I cheered. This game I cheered till the eight inning then booed. So what’s the problem? Grow up. The fans pay and have a right to approve or disapprove of one’s performance. If anything, the players should stand up and admit their bad performances and admit they deserved the boos and not whimper like little kids who go caught being bad, told that they were and then they would whimper that their feelings got hurt. Grow up…….Papalbon needs to learn some new pitches or even the Yankees will not take him.