"Told You So..." Moment of the Week

Our "Told You So..." Moment of the Week goes to Mariano Rivera, and to a lesser extent, Keith Foulke. As we mentioned in our round-up analysis of closers a couple weeks ago, we said that the Red Sox have Rivera's number with the Yankees/Red Sox facing off 19 times during the regular season, and seemingly another 7 times the past couple postseasons. This same problem afflicted Pedro Martinez when he was with the Red Sox facing the Yankee all the time. That's how the Yanks became his "Daddy" so famously. Familiarity breeds contempt (hence the constant fighting between the two teams), but it also breeds Daddies.

Rivera's Daddy has been the Red Sox for a couple years now, and they proved it again today with another blown save by Rivera against the Red Sox, a homerun by Jason Varitek in the 9th inning. Yes, the Yankees eventually won the game, but that doesn't dismiss the fact Rivera blew another save against his haunting foes. He blew his most saves last year against the Red Sox, and blew two more in the playoffs. They own him. As a result, there's always going to be a question as to whether this is going to affect his stats long-term. We said we feared that Rivera was past his prime...this is just the foundation, folks.

Keith Foulke doesn't get a pass either. Maybe one year has already bred the familiarity bug with the Yankees for him, as Derek Jeter smacked a Foulke pitch for a homerun.

The point here is this: even though they're both great closers, when you have two of the best lineups going against each other 19 times (possibly 26) a year, the closers and starting pitchers are always going to be figured out to a pattern in their styles...and eventually find they have a new Daddy.