SarroSports

8/25/08 11:18pm

Once Julio Lugo hurt his quad muscle trying to run out a ground ball July 11th against the Orioles, Sox fans only knew their shortstop situation could go up.  As of August 25th, his replacement standing six feet tall from Salem Oregon, Jed Lowrie is hitting .299 and has gone errorless in 153 chances at short this season.  At the time of his injury, Lugo was hitting .268 with 1 hr and whopping 22 RBIs.  Not exactly Honus Wagner type numbers, Lugo made even Mike Lansing  look great at the dish.  As much as I would like to vent about Lugo’s struggles all season, I promise he wont be mentioned for the rest of this post.

Before Jed Lowrie was drafted in the first round by the Boston Red Sox, he was tearing up the Pac 10 winning player of the year honors in 2004.  At Stanford, scouts described Lowrie as an intelligent shortstop (its Stanford isn’t everyone intelligent) with great work ethic and doubles power.   He hit for average from both sides of the plate and provided above average speed on the bases.  In the field, Lowrie didn’t impress anyone with his range, but made up for it with a good glove.  All credentials worthy of a first round pick.   Three years later, everything scouts have said about that shortstop from Stanford have been very accurate.

Lowrie has had a knack for big hits since his second call up to the big leagues.  None better than his a go-ahead homer in the 11th against Toronto Sunday afternoon.   After taking an outside fastball from Toronto reliever Brandon League over the fence in right field, Lowrie didnt focus too much on what hes accomplished, but chose to speak about whats ahead for him and the Red Sox.  “Any series that we have with New York is going to be a big series, but when we come off a win like this, I feel like everyone will show up and have a little more energy and be able to feed off this game.”Lowrie even gives good quotes, mentioning how the Yankees is always a big series (even though the Yankees look as sluggish as a race between Bartolo Colon and Rich Garces) and how energy is important to any big series.  Maybe its because he went to one of the best colleges in the country, or it might be that he has veteran teammates showing him how to go about the game.  With his steady play at short, his impressive at bats, and his boring but team first quotes, 24 year old Lowrie is here to stay in 2008.  Sox fans couldn’t of expected any of this, but appreciate everything Lowrie does for the team.   In the end, anyone could better than their last shortstop.  Sorry I had to throw in one last jab.

-Sarro