Payday for Paps

(Photo from the Boston Herald)

Jonathan Papelbon is stoked. As he should be. He's going to be making $775,000 next season. Which is less than the apparently $900K he thought he was owed but is still a hefty chunk of change.

I wonder if I should start negotiating like Papelbon. Just start holding news conferences telling people that I believe I'm worth a 100% pay increase. And then I'll pretend to be happy when they only give me a 60% one.

I haven't been talking about Paps' recent spate of blabbermouthery (some interesting English language choices I made in that sentence) because I was kind of hoping that he'd just shut up and it'd all go away. And while I can see his argument, I can also see the other side of it. That being, you're still new here, kid. Give us another year or so and try to scrape by on your $400,000 plus and prove that you can stay healthy and dominating and we'll talk about a pay raise. Maybe start shopping the sales. Get a BJs membership. Carpool with Buccholz and Jacoby.

Look, I don't like it when professional athletes bitch and moan about money because it forces me to not like them for a little bit. I like to live in a world of puppy dogs and rainbows where they all play for the love of the game and they're just so excited to play for the fans that they can't wait to get out of bed in the morning. I know that isn't true. But there are those occasional players who make you believe it more than most. Papelbon is one of them. So to hear him start bitching about money is disillusioning. And I'm sorry, but you're not Mariano Rivera...yet. You might well be some day but there is an element of longevity necessary to demand that kind of thing. You could get there, but you've got to be patient.

Hopefully, this whole thing is settled in such a way that both sides are content and we can go back to Papelbon shaving his head into interesting crop circle configurations or taking the mound in camo face paint for the added intimidation factor. I like that Papelbon much better.

As for the game yesterday, I will tell you this: I might never get tired of the sight of Doug Mirabelli hauling ass around the bases with Jacoby right on his tail. And I do mean *right* on his tail. A ground rule double, er, ruling saved Dougie from getting Jacoby's cleat in his ass but I don't think we've seen the last of that particular brand of fun this season. Doug Mirabelli: Head Down, Running Hard.

Also, did you hear? Jacoby's defense is pretty good. He's making web gem catches in Spring Training games while poor Coco is having groin issues and a root canal. That poor guy just cannot catch a break.

And finally, Derek Lowe appears to have pulled back a bit on his eventual morph into Brad Penny but I am still not convinced that they're two separate people. If someone can find me a picture of the two of them together, I'll consider it. But I know how you kids are today with your computer and your Photoshop and your interwebs. Sort of like how it looks oddly wrong to see Joe Torre in a Dodgers uniform. Right? That's weird, isn't it?