All is forgiven in Boston: late on Wednesday night, the Boston Globe reported that “the Nation” had inked a contract with Tampa Bay Rays’ uber-star Carl Crawford. The Globe says that Crawford will become a Red Sox for seven years and $142 million. Outside of Cliff Lee and Jayson Werth, Crawford was the class of the 2010 free agent class, hitting .307 with 19 home runs and 47 stolen bases. The Red Sox and Crawford haven’t exactly had the best relationship; back in May of 2009 (Red Sox fans will surely remember), Crawford stole six bases on the Red Sox — in what one baseball site headlined as “Grand Theft Boston.” The Red Sox were not pleased, whining (note: the Nationals complain, the Tiants whine) that Crawford stole his sixth base unnecessarily. The one palliative that Red Sox fans can point to (now that Crawford is in the fold) is that the loudest complaint came from former Red Sox hurler Brad “Bad” Penny, a veteran of the Massachusetts Penal League. Penny, who some people describe as “a southern gentleman,” wasn’t so much ripped at Crawford’s sixth steel, as he was at his fifth — when Crawford stole third, off of . . . Penny. After the game, however, Red Sox skipper Terry Francona dampened the complaints, explaining that Crawford is really fast.

What’s really juicy about the Crawford signing is that the reporter who broke it, Peter Abraham, wrote back at the beginning of the season that if he were the Red Sox — and was given a choice between Jayson Werth and Crawford — he’d take Werth. While this doesn’t exactly relegate “the Nation” to the status of province, it sheds light on all those nasty comments made about Mike Rizzo for signing the former Phillie. The signing of Crawford should not be unexpected: it reflects Boston’s yen for getting in on the action, particularly if they feel that the dreaded pinstripers are somehow gaining on them (or are extending their furlongs, as the case may be). After all, Soxologist Peter Gammons was saying on MLB Network, just hours before the deal was reported, that the Yankees (being the Yankees) were going hard after Cliff Lee. With C.C. already in the fold, the Yanks would have to be the odds-on favorites to take the A.L. East. The Red Sox deal also eliminates the Belinskis from the Crawford sweepstakes, despite the fact that Crawford was considered a natural fit for L.A., and despite the fact that the Angels’ front office was leveraging their front-runner status by telling everyone that a Crawford-to-the-Angels deal was nearly a lock.

But for all the talk about Werth and Crawford and the Red Sox and Lee, there’s a bit of suck-in-your-stomach bad news here. The loss of Crawford, and the probable trade of starter Matt Garza, probably puts Tampa out of the running for any late season berth. And the deal highlights the struggles of mid-size and small market teams (like the Rays), who (while they might catch lightning, maybe once or twice) are eventually relegated to being development squads for the likes of Hal and Theo. Just ask Kansas City, which monopolized the other headline today: for signing all-world-average, but really cheap, Jeff Francoeur. You have to wonder: will that be tomorrow’s headline in The Kansas City Star? Here’s the latest: according to MLB Trade Rumors, Boston’s deal for Crawford won’t become official until Friday, after Crawford passes his physical.

DWilly’s piece yesterday about the Red Sox was right on the money: their age is showing. I’ve been looking for a word that describes their play since the All Star break and I’ve had a difficult time coming up with just the right moniker. Then, this morning, I read a piece in the New York Times on the Sox newest Japanese import Junichi Tazawa and there it was: “wheezing.”  Perfect. Their batting averages show it precisely. The Red Sox top four guys are hitting .297, .300, .292 and .308.  After that the averages fall off, with their eight- and nine-slotted guys (Varitek and Gonzalez) not hitting their weight — at .222 and .210 respectively. Combine that with a two man rotation and you get what you get.

It is a truism that this not the ’04 ball club. There is no “Cowboy Up” talk and no emotional sparkplug. There is no Kevin Millar. The oldest guy in the Sox lineup that year was third baseman Bill Mueller, who was 33.  Today Varitek is 37, third sacker Mike Lowell is 35 (both, shown below, in the ’07 series) and two other guys are 33. Not the geriatric ward but no spring chickens either. But there is one similarity with the ’04 club. Today the Sox are 70 – 52, 6.5 games behind the Yanks. On this day five years ago they were in a similar position: 70 – 53, 6.5 games behind the Empire. The Sox finished the ’04 campaign with 98 wins, which is .700 baseball.  But without a bottom half of the lineup and a beat up pitching staff it’ll be quite a feat to match their ’04 glory.

Centerfield Gate writer DWilly, a member of the Fenway faithful (but ardent Nats supporter), weighs in on the woes of “the Nation” — despite their win Saturday vs. the Yankees.

So . . . here’s the question: what happened to the Red Sox? I have two answers. First, too many of their regulars got old in a hurry and, second — their highly touted starting pitching was a mile wide, but an inch deep.

At this point, the Red Hose have only four everyday players they can count on – Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis and the newly added Victor Martinez. The team hasn’t had consistent play at shortstop since they let Orlando Cabrera walk after the ’04 season. At third base, Mike Lowell is game, but his hip could give out at any moment. Oh, and don’t forget, J.D. “Nancy” Drew came in third in a recent Sports Illustrated list of “which player gets the least out of the most talent.” (He was tied with Elijah Dukes.) Jason Varitek is running on empty. It was painful to listen to last Saturday night’s game vs. Texas when the Rangers stole eight bases. None of Varitek’s throws was even close. Jason Bay had a great first half before going into a prolonged funk. Sure, he’s picked it up a little recently, but he’s still only hitting .255. And then there’s Big Papi. I don’t know whether he’s part of the Dominican tradition of fudging your birth certificate, but he looks a lot older than 33.

Meanwhile, the Sox starting pitching is painfully thin. Brad Penny has won once in his last 11 starts and seems headed for assignment when Tim Wakefield returns on Wednesday. Dice-K is still in rehab, and Junichi Tazawa is unproven. A better bet at this stage may be to ask one of the stellar relievers (like Manny Delcarmen), to go 5 innings every five days and let the bullpen do the rest. Picking up Billy Wagner should help.

It's no use arguing: these are not your '04 or '07 Red Sox

The tell-tale sign for me that the team’s purported deep pitching staff was really more of mirage came in the days after the July 31 trading deadline. It was reported that Theo Epstein gave the Mariners a list of eight top prospects and told them to pick five in a bid for Felix Hernandez. On that list were Clay Buchholz, Daniel Bard and Michael Bowden.  At 22, Bowden has had a mediocre season in AAA and his trade value took a dive with last night’s 2-inning stint vs. the NY Junkees (8 hits, 3 walks, 7 runs). Bard, with his 100 mile-an-hour heater, could be the team’s next closer if they don’t re-sign Papelbon next year. Meanwhile Buchholz, after a pathetic game in Baltimore when he gave up 7 runs in 4 innings, has looked good in the last three starts, particularly his last one when he bested Roy Halladay in Toronto. If the season ended tomorrow, Buchholz would be the third starter in the playoffs after Beckett and Lester. That said, the Mariners’ response to Theo’s offer might have been predicted: they took a pass.

I don’t want to say the Sox won’t make the playoffs. Texas is good, but the Rangers lack a top-line starter. Tampa Bay scares me the most. The Rays are three games behind the Sox in the wild card chase. Boston and Tampa Bay square off six times in the first two weeks of September. It will be a key series and might well determine the season for the Fenway faithful. Sox fans know their team will probably make the playoffs. But they also know that this year’s team is not the same as the one that triumphed in the ’04 and 07 world series. There are just too many holes.

Wily Mo (aka “Wily Modesto”) Pena is this year’s Washington Nationals left fielder — exhibit number one that this guy has a hankering for molding the Nats into Cincinnati East. Not great news, considering the senior circuit’s oldest club just hired this destroyer-of-perfectly-good- pitching-arms. But Jimmy never saw a Redleg he didn’t love, and he absolutely loves Wily Mo: “His power works at any stadium,” Bowden said soon after Wily Mo arrived on the scene. “He is a good kid with a big heart. He has got to be driven. You have to stay on top of him. You have to get him to work hard.” At 6-3 and 215, Wily Mo can drive the ball: he hit 26 home runs for the Reds in 2004, with 66 RBIs. The downside? Wily Mo swings through the ball: 118 strikeouts in 336 at bats. You’ve got to get him to work hard?

You’ve got to get him to make contact — that’s what you’ve got to do.

After the next year — after 2005 — the Reds had seen enough of Wily Mo and dealt him to Boston for Bronson Arroyo. The deal looked like a brilliant move for Cincy, and one of the few knuckleheaded moves made by Boston Red Sox (“oh, those dirt dogs”) wunderkind Theo Epstein. Theo had it all figured out. “Pena strikes out on a rate basis more than anyone else in the big leagues,” Epstein said in his usual snooty neo-empiricist meanderings right after the trade. “There is precedent for those (type) players developing a little bit more discipline, increasing their walk rate and becoming better all around hitters as they adjust to the big leagues.” Oh yeah, Theo, like who? We might point out (dearest Theo) that, while with Cincinnati, Pena struck out more times than Arroyo had struck out batters.

Stick that in your “rate basis.”

In 2006, Arroyo was 14-11 with a 3.29 ERA for the Reds while Wily Mo continued to battle the breezes: 94 strikeouts in 289 ABs. We might imagine Theo rethinking this just a tad and looking around the league to see just who would take Wily Mo off his hands. So Pena came to the Nats for a player to be named, who turned out to be 25-year-old first baseman Chris Carter. Not bad really: Wily Mo is a solid citizen, a team player, and has a lot of heart (Jim is right about that, but you can dismiss his other statement — “his power works at any stadium” — really Jim, no shit). Then too, while Wily Mo doesn’t run a lot of sprints, ya gotta luv him. For all of Jim’s talk about how ya gotta stay on him, Wily Mo works hard. I’ve seen him run up the steps onto the field. As our friends at Nats320 point out, he is “big, strong, and incredibly confident.” And yahavtaluvaguy who is modest about what he needs to work on: “I need to work on my defense and my hitting,” he told Nats320. And his baserunning: no one would ever mistake Wily Mo for Willie Mays Hayes.

There’s an upside, which no one who saw him play in RFK last year will forget. Before he arrived the Nats averaged 3.9 runs per game, but with him in the line-up they averaged five runs a game, and his defensive statistics were surprisingly good. He’s quicker with the glove than he looks: no errors in 57 chances. He ate up NL East pitching, hitting .324 with six HRs in 30 games. Which makes him my pick to put one out on Opening Day, against the hated Braves. But the moment I can’t wait for (next year, methinks) is when Wily Mo sticks one in the parking garage and Theo takes out his slide rule, does a few calculations — and tells us “told ya so.”

It’ll be worth the strikeouts.