Look outside the window. Grimace. Then realize that somewhere, in a magical land known as Florida, spring is only one day away. Pitchers and Catchers Day is almost here, which means that spring is creeping closer to our frozen city. Ballplayers will be ready to welcome in the season when they finally get back to Fenway. The journey just happens to take them to Florida, Japan, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Toronto before spring finally reaches......

"Bye-weeks. Bronco Nagurski didn't get no bye-weeks! And now he's dead! Well, maybe they're a good thing." - Moe, The Simpsons These are the times that try fan's souls. The cavalcade of ridiculousness that is Media Day is long over, but the actual game is still three looooooong days away. But with 564,000 media members stomping around Greater Phoenix, stories will be filed even if there's no story there. And we have to talk about......

BootWatch: Tom Brady sprained his right ankle. It is a high ankle sprain viewed as minor, according to the local media types, and while it's a big enough deal to have rendered The Boot necessary in New York on Monday, it's not enough to keep QB Brady out of the Really, Really Big Game on February 3. We're going to go out on a limb here and state that we're not going to invest much......

A New England Patriots fan told Joe Fitzgerald at the Herald that some overzealous Pats fans beat up him, his friend, and his cousins, who happened to be Jaguars fans and who were wearing Jaguar gear, after the Pats-Jaguars game. Brian Wormstead recounts the appalling pummeling he received in the parking lot after a brief exchange with the Pats fans: "I just know I’ve got a punctured eardrum and lumps all over me; Chris has......

We're the most starry-eyed, green-Kool-Aid-guzzling optimists anywhere, but even we never thought it would be this good, this fast. Even on a night when two-thirds of Ghidorah wasn't quite up to snuff (Ray Allen 4-for-14, Kevin Garnett missing his usual double-double), the Celtics still had enough to put the clamps on Jersey and win their seventh straight. Any time you defensively hold a team to 69 points and 33% shooting, you're doing something right. And......

Bostonist sends a hearty congratulations to Rebecca Watson, of Brookline, for winning the Public Radio Talent Quest. Watson will have the opportunity to produce a pilot to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Watson was one of the top three winners out of 1,500 contestants. She joins Al Letson, of Jacksonville, FL, and Glynn Washington, of Oakland, CA. Weekend America did an interview with all three. Although three people won, Watson came in first, and deservedly......

Dare we say things are starting to click at the right time? The Red Sox finished off Oakland with an 11-6 win. Now only a monumental collapse (look upward; no lightning) will keep the Red Sox from celebrating an AL East clinchin' party in the next day or two. The Sox smacked Oakland largely due to the bat of Mike Lowell, who collected five of his 116 RBIs (a Red Sox 3B record) on a......

The Red Sox were at home, facing down the Oakland A's on Tuesday night, but everyone had one eye on events unfolding in Florida. And wouldn't you know? Things worked out perfectly. The drama-filled Oakland game (only in September would one be able to string those words together) was decisively won by Boston and featured numerous reasons for the Fenway crowd to stand up and cheer. Tampa Bay managed to scratch together a 10-inning, 7-6,......

The Red Sox didn't play yesterday, so of course they were more successful than usual of late, picking up half a game on the Yankees (thanks, Toronto!). Now they face their final homestand, against Oakland and Minnesota. This looked at the beginning of the season like a rough end to the season, but both those clubs have been surprisingly bad this season. Remember, all the Red Sox have to do is win five of the......

So many big court cases went down this week, so we're wrapping up the latest. --The first witness testified Tuesday in the Franklin Park Zoo Amok Ape Trial, which will determine the amount that will be awarded to a 2-year-old girl was attacked by an ape in 2003. The girl's mother, Terrasita Duarte-Scott, is suing Zoo New England because her daughter was injured and probably has a flood of nightmares thanks to the episode. Courtney......

When the Public Radio Talent Quest was announced in April, Public Radio Exchange and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting said they were looking for the elusive quality of "hostiness." A woman from Brookline has proven that she has the "hostiness." Rebecca Watson has risen to the top five out of a field of 1,500 contestants to be a new public-radio star. Watson blogs at skepchick.org, and her proposed show is based on that site. The......

We at the Gothamist network would like to express our heartfelt wishes to the people of Minnesota in the days after their tragic bridge collapse. We're not trying to discount the severity of the accident by making note of it in opposition to our usual -Ist lightheartedness - we just wanted to take a moment and recognize those affected last week. After the Minneapolis bridge collapse, Bostonist did some research and found that Massachusetts bridges......

The Red Sox rotation needs no introduction. We already have three ten-game winners, a potential Hall-of-Famer on the injured list, and warhorse Julian Tavarez on the back end. But, with possible apologies to Curt Schilling's one-hitter in Oakland, none of them have come up with a gem like youngster Kason Gabbard threw last night. The 25-year-old lefty threw the Sox' third complete game and second shutout last night, bedazzling the Royals to the tune of......

Take us to DEFCON 3. The Red Sox were pasted at Fenway last night. Somehow (we can't explain it), the game seemed closer than the 12-2 final score indicated, but you can't really find a silver lining in a cloud this dark. Curt Schilling and the bullpen kept giving up big hits, and the Red Sox kept not getting big hits, which has become a troubling leitmotif all month long. Two runs a game generally......

Any gripes anyone has with Curt Schilling - his ego, his politics, his whatever - roll 'em up in a ball and store them somewhere for a while. Because the man is clutch. With the Red Sox reeling and poised to be swept out of Oakland, #38 stepped up to the mound and threw a one-hitter. As in, one Oakland hit. As in, if Alex Cora were a foot taller or had been playing a......

In the winter of 1846-47, a party of 33 settlers, led by brothers Jacob and George Donner, ran into a snowstorm in the Sierra Mountains. After a few months of ox-slaughtering and shivering, fifteen of them set off to find some help. They, of course, famously got caught in a blizzard and had to resort to cannibalism to stay alive. This historical tidbit is meant merely to provide perspective, and reflect that this week's Sox......

You can't help but kind of miss Lenny DiNardo. The guy, for all accounts, is a pretty young, affable, decent enough guy with an arm that wasn't Beckett standout, but still something to look out for. When the Red Sox let him go to clear room on the roster for J.D. Drew, we weren't heartbroken, but there was a moment of disappointment, too. Of course, DiNardo looks even better when he's pitching scoreless ball -......

You play until the late hours against your fiercest rival, then fly six hours cross-country to face one of the toughest pitchers out there. How would you fare? If you're the Red Sox, you'd fare badly for a while, then really well, then disappointed. Oakland starter Danny Haren was fantastic, shutting the Sox down with 9 strikeouts through the eighth. So Boston did what they do best, which is bide their time until the bullpen......

The Red Sox have been living large off of the Foes' inferior bullpens all season. Sadly, what goes around came around last night. The unstoppable Okajima and unbeatable Papelbon were respectively stopped and beaten by the Yankees, who took 2 out of 3 from the Sox for the second straight series. This one was a typical Sox-Yankees seesaw affair. Josh Beckett pitched well, but spotted the Yanks a 4-0 lead. But the Sox got it......

The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day, The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play. So begins Ernest Thayer's immortal "Casey at the Bat". Mudville flops in that poem, as we all know, but the situation was even more grim for the Red Sox going into the ninth on Sunday. Orioles youngster Jeremy Guthrie was firmly in control of the ballgame, and the score at Fenway stood......

6-0. Sounds good, doesn't it? Well, it looked grim for a while for Josh Beckett and the Sox. Dan Johnson broke a 2-2 tie in the top of the sixth with an RBI single, but the Sox rallied off 2 off the Oakland bullpen in the bottom of the inning. Then Okajima and Timlin shut the A's down, and just like that, Beckett became the majors' first six-game winner in the 6-4 triumph. Bostonist hearts......

-- Like many a Red Sox fan, Bostonist was feeling cocky at the top of the ninth inning in Tuesday's game hosting Oakland. Why wouldn't we? The Sox had a 4-2 lead and Jonathan Papelbon was heading in to finish out the game. It was ovah. Until Travis Buck hit that two-run shot to right field. It was a big hit in more ways than one: it brought Oakland back into a game that it......

First, the Patriots draft troubled but talented safety Brandon Meriweather. Now, they trade for talented but troubled wide receiver Randy Moss, for a fourth-round pick and a round of KFC Famous Bowls. Is Bill Belichick trying to start a gang? Or is he convinced that he can take these miscreants and ne'er-do-wells and mold them into a Super Bowl team? Our money is on the latter. "There's no such thing as a bad boy," said......

There are two types of people in the world: those who are willing to slog through rain, wind, possible snow (hey, you never know) and agony to complete a marathon, and...the other kind. Bostonist freely admits to being the other kind. But to everyone who wills their way through this, we tip our hats, raise our glasses, and count our blessings that we'll be home watching you on TV. If you have time to fiddle......

Have we pretty much run out of Japan-themed headlines? Almost? OK. After all the hype and promise, Daisuke turned out to be everything Red Sox Nation could have hoped for. Of course, he gave up six hits and a run, so there's room for improvement, but Dice was firmly in control of the hapless Royals in the 4-1 victory. Which puts the Red Sox alone in first place, and makes us feel a little silly......

Could you rank sports cities — objectively, now — by the number of MVP seasons that city has witnessed?The above is the question asked by Curtis Edmonds on his Northbound blog in response to a recent WaPo article. The most valuable city is – drum roll – Boston. We're not talking passion, championships, or even money spent on professional sports. Pure statistical analysis of the Most Valuable Player awards awarded to players on the teams.......

On Sunday afternoon, things didn't start spectacularly for the New England Patriots, but they sure did end that way. The Pats prevailed in Foxboro yesterday in front of a full house at Gillette Stadium by the score of 19-17. The Pats season started in what looked to be a disastrous manner. The season's first play for the Pats was not what Pats fans had envisioned for the inaugural play of the 2006 campaign. On......

Forbes came out with yet another poll this year, this time focusing on the single kids out there looking for love. Boston has remained steady for the second year in a row as the second best city in the U.S. for single people. With a significant number of students flowing in and out of the city each September, Boston always has a great number of young people to begin with; add some solid nightlife......

The debacle that was Hot Stove, Cool Music last week has made us ready for a week of good music. The debacle in that it poured so hard they had to move the whole thing under the bleachers (inside). The sound quality was poor and James Taylor pulled a rock star move and only made the stage for a single song because he didn't have enough space. This week we're looking forward to cooler......

Little darling, it's been a long cold lonely winter. Little darling, it feels like years since it's been here. What's better than Bostonist ripping off lines of Beatles songs on a Monday? Checking out the Boy Least Likely To show at TT's. What's better than Bostonist ripping off Beatles lyrics on a Tuesday? The Aaron Goldberg Trio's Boston CD release party. What's better…oh you get the point. Check out this week's music picks for......