Results tagged “Dan Shaughnessy”

Superficially, it looked like the old rivalry again. The Sixers have brought back the old logo, the old floor from the Spectrum (more or less) and uniforms that hearken back to the days of Dr. J and Andrew Toney. But the team that Philly put on the floor last night was no match for the early 09-10 Celtics. The '83 Sixers might not have been.

When we last saw the Chicago Bulls, it was after the Celtics survived a seven-game street fight of a playoff series. Last night, the Bulls tapped out in about seven minutes. Perhaps that's an exaggeration on the part of Bostonist but the Celtics thoroughly outclassed the team, 118-90.

But that's kind of a big deal, since it matches their season high. The "team goes up...team goes down" Bruins survived a tough beginning to come back and win in a shootout in Ottawa last night, 4-3.

The power drunk wafflers at the New York Times Company have changed their minds again about the Boston Globe. Turns out, it isn't a huge gaping money suck anymore, and Sulzberger and friends no longer want to sell it. We have yet to confirm that the Times Co. front office has done any real number crunching on Dan Shaughnessy's expense report. [Globe]

"Whatever the hex is, I guess somebody un-hexed it," said the Angels' Chone Figgins. We're not sure what that hex may be, or if it's really gone, but last night, the Angels looked like hex-free division winners. And the Red Sox looked like a team that staggered into the playoffs, mustering no offense and succumbing meekly to Anaheimorwhatever 5-0.

The Twins beat the Tigers, so the field of eight is set in the baseball playoffs. All we can do now is wait. And wait and wait and wait. The Red Sox won't play until tomorrow night, when all the other first-round playoff series start today.

Well, not us as in Bostonist and its beloved readers. But the Angels hate coming here once the first fall wind blows. They can barely win a playoff game here to save their lives, and lost their second straight at Fenway with a sour taste in their mouths.

Somehow, in the quagmire and the deluge that took turns drenching the city yesterday, the Red Sox and the Rays found time to get in five innings. But one was really all the Sox needed.

OK. So much for the AL East pennant. The Yankees all but clinched the division last night, taking the rubber match of their series at Fenway with a low-scoring 8-4 win. Most troubling is that the eight runs came at the expense of Josh Beckett, about the most worry-free guy on the roster. Nobody's worry-free today.

With the national sports media focused on steroids, Nick Green's legal use of amphetamines before every game has gone virtually unnoticed.

Our friends at Gothamist are sounding like, well, Red Sox fans used to sound. The team is playing well. But, ... Been there. Surprisingly, Bostonist is not entirely pessimistic today. Yes, the Red Sox appear to be flatlining after five straight losses to their closest rivals, including back-to-back shutouts at the hands of the Yankees and their top two starters. No runs in 24 straight innings is a statistic one can't ignore. Oh, there's the matter of Kevin Youkilis being miscast as an outfielder.

Are we in the pennant race yet? Because whatever it is the Red Sox are racing towards, it doesn't feel like a pennant. They're 3-8 in their last eleven games, they're failing against an Oakland/Baltimore portion of the schedule that seemed designed to give them some momentum coming out of the All-Star Break, and they're exposing serious flaws in almost every aspect of the game that isn't named Josh Beckett.

It started off well. #14 was unveiled in right field, the man of the hour got to speak, and everyone was happy. On Jim Rice Day at Fenway, what could go wrong?

Sunday's slow pace followed an action-packed July 4 for this Bostonist. That left free time for some idle thoughts on some pressing, or not depending on your perspective, issues:

Sure, if you win the Stanley Cup, you get your name engraved on it, you get to take it home for a day to do whatever you want with it, and kids from Yellowknife to Halifax go to bed dreaming of it. But still, when your year is over, you usually have to give it back. Usually to the Red Wings.

Tom Brady spoke to us! He loves us!? After months of gossip and stolen glimpses, #12 finally expressed himself to a non-Kraft owned "media" outlet as he talked shop with Peter King of Sports Illustrated for the June 1 issue. Yes, Brady also added another cover to his collection. Seeing Tom rock his helmet is great. Seeing him on the cover of SI isn't necessarily a good thing. Dan Shaughnessy opined on Brady today. Apparently, Tom, Gisele and Jack were stalking Danny Boy, well, he seems to think they were.

It had been almost three weeks since the Red Sox cracked double digits. More importantly, it had been almost three days since the Sox won a game. Luckily, both those streaks ended.

In this multicultural, diverse, secular country we inhabit, there are holidays, there are holy days, and then there's Opening Day. All good people, save for a few heretic holdouts, have this day circled on their calendar as the final sign that winter is coming to an end and summer is just around the corner. It's a day of new beginnings.

"It was an emotionless game and if I’m somebody on the outside watching our team right now, I don’t see a lot of character that you could really identify with." - Andrew Ference

Doc Rivers insisted that last night's game was fraught with peril. Even though the Celtics were visiting the atrocious Clippers, it was the last game of a seven-month road trip (or so it seemed), and there's always danger of the players mentally checking out before the last 48 minutes of a trip are finished.

The Bruins are back! For the moment!

Maybe being at home got stagnant. After losing to two Western powers at the Garden, the Celtics hit the road and got themselves a win, beating the Hornets 89-77 in New Orleans. Paul Pierce led the show with 30 points, while KG chipped in 10 rebounds and Rondo added 11 assists. The only bad spot was for Ray Allen, who had to come out in the first half with a thumb injury and only got one point. He says he's going to try to play tonight in Dallas.

35 seconds. That's all that separates a decent team from (a) hanging around against the Bruins, and (b) being another notch in the team's collective hockey stick. For two periods, the Flyers hung around with the Bruins. Which was nice for them.

There was playoff intensity at the Garden last night. Sure, the playoffs are months and months away, but when the Canadiens come to town, it's always lively, especially when the home team is playing the way the Bruins are playing now. (Which is kind of hypothetical, since the Bruins have never played this well in our fanlifetimes.)

"We want to be greedy," said Claude Julien. And why not? After successively blanking the Oilers and the Canucks on 1-0 scored, the Bruins were hungry and ready to go for the Western Canadian sweep in Calgary. And when Patrice Bergeron caught Flames goalie Miikka Kiprusoff out of position for the quick 1-0 lead, Coach Julien's green looked like it might be rewarded.

The Red Sox didn't just win a series the other night. They may have destroyed a Major League franchise. The Angels, winners of 100 games and the best record in the bigs, spend the entire flight home to California boo-hooing about how this never should have happened.

First place was in their grasp. So close. Josh Beckett was humming, the Rays were putting up a line of zeroes, and even though it was only 1-0, the Red Sox had to feel good about taking first back last night.

Folks...the late season magic has arrived.

Someone switched pages in the script.

It's pretty sweet, isn't it? The Red Sox are going into Yankee Stadium for the last time (OK, OK, the last time during the regular season), Tim Wakefield made a more-or-less triumphant return to the rotation, the bullpen pitched as well as it has all year, and Alex Rodriguez was booed off the field by the Bronx more-or-less faithful. And the mighty Rays are stumbling, so the Sox are right back in this thing. It's a good day.