Lack Of Pitching

Lackey's often expression of frustration
on the mound sometimes were thought to
have shown up his teammates.

The downward spiral of the Boston Red Sox organization continued Tuesday with a major injury to their already thin pitching staff. Right-hander John Lackey will undergo Tommy John surgery and miss his 2012 season before it even got started.

Newly appointed general manager Ben Cherington broke the news in his promotion press conference just hours after his predecessor Theo Epstein was formally introduced as the new president of baseball operations of the Chicago Cubs.

Lackey is coming off the worse season of 10-year career, where he was 12-12 and posted a career-worst 6.41 ERA in 160 innings. He led the majors in earned runs surrendered with 114 and hit batsman, 19.

In his first two years in Boston, Lackey's record is barely above .500 at 26-23 and has a 5.26 in his 61 starts. Prior to the 2010 season, the Texan signed a similar five-year $82.5 contract that New York gave A.J. Burnett just an offseason before.

Next season will be the third year of that contract and with this recent news, it has been three years of disappointment.

Lackey is the third pitcher in the Red Sox organization to undergo reconstructive elbow surgery, joining Japanese import Daisuke Matsuzaka and left-hander Rich Hill to suffer the same fate. Fortunately for Cherington and the Red Sox, Matsuzaka, who will be in the final year of his current contract, should be pitching for the club midseason.

In the team's historic September collapse, where Boston went 7-20 in the season's final month to miss the postseason for the second straight, Lackey, along with fellow teammates Jon Lester and Josh Beckett, was accused of drinking beer and eating fried chicken in the clubhouse on days they were not pitching.

And when he was on the mound he didn't provide much help either. In his five September starts, opponents hit .353 against Lackey, going 0-2 and 9.13 ERA.

There had been speculation the San Diego Padres would be interested in acquiring the 33-year-old right-hander from Boston this offseason, but this injury has quieted any talk of that now. San Diego and Boston have a well working relationship thanks in large part to their now former GM Jed Hoyer.

Hoyer had been the assistant GM to Epstein in Boston until he took the GM job with the Padres in October of 2009. He will now join Epstein in Chicago as the GM of the Cubs.

A move back to the West Coast would have ensured Lackey a reunion with his former pitching coach in Anaheim, Bud Black. Those were the best years of Lackey's career, including winning Game 7 of the 2002 World Series as a rookie, winning a career-high 19 games in 2007 and leading the American League in ERA at 3.01 that same season.

The Red Sox are in the midst of some major personnel changes with the change at GM and the uncertainty who their next manager will be after Terry Francona decided it was time for a new voice at the helm after the season, but that won't stop owner John Henry and CEO Larry Lucchino from putting a contender on the field for the Fenway Faithful in 2012.

With their lack of pitching, Boston will be in the market for starting pitching this offseason with the availability of left-hander C.J. Wilson and possible open bidding for another Japanese import phenom, 25-year-old Yu Darvish.

As for Lackey, it has been a long two years for the 6-foot-6 righty in Beantown and it will be an even longer road back to a big league mound and his once All-Star form.