Now It's Beckett Trade Talk

I guess this is good news for Kevin Youkilis.

I invite you to look at Josh Beckett's career numbers, particularly 2011 (despite the bad finish, he had a good year) and his postseason numbers. He is Mr. October, with only one postseason defeat in his Sox tenure. His win in game five of the 2007 ALCS, in Cleveland, was the key to that series. There is no 2007 championship without Josh Beckett.

For the record, I'm against trading him.

But I'm not going to crusade about it. What would be the point?

Is he off to a bad start? Yes.

Does he have an attitude problem? Do we really, honestly know? Show me the one player who said, "Josh Beckett is a bad teammate" or anything like it.

We ask these guys to be brutal competitors, and we ask them to care.

OK, fine. That's our right as fans of this goofy game. But when we ask them how to care, how to live every aspect of their lives, we ask too much. It would be one thing if the guy broke the law, but he's done nothing close to that.

Like Jim said last night, something has to give soon. One thing working against Beckett, in the war for hearts and minds, is that he has never really been the absolute Ace the way Clemens was, Sabathia is, or Verlander was last year. He has been really good most of the time, but there were long stretches where he struggled. He seems to be in one now, at the worst possible time.

I guess it's OK to trade Mr. October if you don't expect to be playing in the postseason. But I'm against it.

One more thing -- It's refreshing to see some old school panic around here. We were getting so complacent.