The Red Sox open the 2023 season Thursday afternoon at Fenway Park.
First pitch in opposition to Baltimore is at 2:10 p.m.
Pregame festivities start at 12:30 with the ceremonial elevating of the White Flag to honor
Boston’s 2022 last-place end.
Plenty of excellent seats are nonetheless accessible.
For Opening Day.
At checklist value.
Or under.
And it isn’t even going to snow.
That’s not a throwaway line. It’s a sobering reality. As of this writing, dozens of seats between
first and third base have been nonetheless accessible for checklist value (plus charges) by means of the Red Sox official ticket
web site. For Opening Day. The crash within the secondary ticket market rivals that of FTX.
And not all these accessible seats are strategically positioned behind poles. One instance:
Section 24, Row 9, Seats 1-4. Each seat presents a transparent and unobstructed view of the complete
taking part in area – save for a spot within the deep left-field nook. Nothing however Fenway Park’s pristine,
hallowed area, an 80-foot-long MassMutual signal above the massive display, and the alluring
BetMGM brand emblazoned throughout the Green Monster.
If this helps John Henry, LeBron James & Co. fill seats, so be it. Tickets to Opening Day at
Fenway Park have been coveted household jewels, handed down by means of wills, divorce decrees, or gifted
on Christmas Day. Now they’re merely barcodes on the MLB Ballpark app and as widespread as Dunkin’ drive-thrus.
The abundance of accessible tickets, er, digital entry codes, for Opening Day and past maybe finest illustrates the sullen state of the Red Sox inside the area’s sports activities soul.
If this retains up, Tom Werner might have to interchange “Sweet Caroline” with “The Sounds of
Silence.”
The Red Sox have been crowded off your screens, feeds, radios, podcasts and the again web page
since they locked up Rafael Devers by means of 2033 with a 10-year, $313.5 million contract
extension.
Signing Devers to the largest contract in Boston sports activities historical past was the naked minimal the Red
Sox wanted to do to stay above the relevance waterline.
Gone are the times after we hotly debated whether or not the Red Sox are the preferred group in
city. In 2023, they’re barely hanging on to fourh place, simply forward of the Boston Pride, New
England Revolution and AFC Richmond.
The hype machine was tuned up in earnest Tuesday. A roster of dignitaries met the media at
Fenway, amongst them Mayor Wu of Boston and Prime Minister Jim Rice of Red Sox Nation. The
new group clubhouse seemed snazzy bathed in a smooth magenta hue.
The Red Sox misplaced pitcher Nathan Eovaldi, their finest total participant in Xander Bogaerts, and their
2022 chief in doubles and strikeouts in J.D. Martinez, to free company within the offseason.
But what they misplaced on the sector, they’ve made up for on the menu. New to the Red Sox
“lineup” in 2023: cheddar and caramel popcorn, crab cake sandwiches, crispy avocado fries
and gluten free pizza.
Adds an entire new which means to gasoline up the Duck Boats.
Our personal Gabrielle Starr reviews that the Red Sox have an AI characteristic close to Gate Okay the place children at
Fenway can face MLB pitching. The group has but to substantiate if opposing hitters at Fenway will
be doing the identical.
We solely child as a result of we care. Someone should.
The Red Sox have performed their finest in charting a course to irrelevance. For many, dropping Bogaerts
was the octane increase essential to gasoline an emotional and monetary separation from the group.
It was arduous even for NESN to masks the vacant seats at JetBlue Park this spring. AI isn’t that
good.
The Red Sox are removed from the one native franchise coming off a sub-.500 end. Dysfunction and
chaos have engulfed the Kremlin on Route 1 in Foxboro. But “Bill vs. Bob” has the makings of a
Netflix sequence. We can’t get sufficient. Not to say Lamar Jackson. Maybe Mac Jones throws
out the primary pitch Thursday. Hope Matt Milano isn’t there to choose it off.
The solely drama surrounding the Red Sox is what number of personalities on its radio affiliate might be
booted off the air for botched makes an attempt at humor.
Masataka Yoshida, cowl your ears.
Given the tepid expectations surrounding the group, beginning the season in obscurity is simply what
these Red Sox want. Maybe they’ll nonetheless be in rivalry when Patrice Bergeron returns to
Fenway Park in June with the Stanley Cup.
The Red Sox gained 78 video games in 2022. Their over/below this season is 78.5. It opened at 76 earlier than everybody within the Commonwealth took the over.
Matt Lindeman runs the baseball buying and selling desk at WynnBET. He’s agnostic in the case of
fandom, so we requested him what oddsmakers take into consideration the 2023 Red Sox.
It’s far much less appetizing than avocado fries.
“There’s a lot of excitement in Massachusetts because it’s the first time they’re able to bet on
the Red Sox win total. I don’t know if this is the best year to have the over on the Red Sox. They
did not have a good offseason. The pitching staff is old and frail. The lineup just isn’t that deep
and lacks star power. Outside of Devers, they have a lot of question marks,” Lindeman mentioned. “In
that division with the Orioles not being a bottom-feeder anymore, and those other three teams
being in contention, it’s going to be really tough to get over that win total.”
Unbowed, this columnist made his first authorized sports activities bets within the Commonwealth on Jan. 31 at
Encore. I took the Red Sox over 76 wins, at +300 to make the playoffs, and Triston Casas to be
Rookie of the Year at +900.
Just doing my half to fund the state coffers.
And giving myself a cause to look at baseball after Labor Day.
Bill Speros (@BillSperos and @RealOBF) may be reached at [email protected]
Source: www.bostonherald.com