Boston will be fighting some very tough teams this season. The AL East has some very difficult teams that you will have to fight off if you’re on one of the teams. The Red Sox, Rays and Yankees will be battling for the first, and presumably second, positions in the division this year. It will be one of those years that the Red Sox need to really be on top of their game. They have some players that are older and on the decline. Other players are too young to be considered serious quite yet. There are injuries to consider as well. In other words, this team, while strong, has several weak points that we hope wont harm us through the year. Perhaps they will make a couple more moves. Or maybe the new Pedroia-Youkilis-based team will be much more ready than expected.

The good news is this: The WBC is over, allowing for no more opportunity for their players to continue getting injured before the season even begins. Now the bad news. It’s not tragic or disastrous. Just a little bit melancholy. Curt Schilling has retired from baseball. This news comes from his blog, which mentioned the news this morning. Immediately, other players, managers and fans started commenting on this event, saying that it was quite a lot of fun for us to watch him all these years, and he’s also given us some great games. We wish him the best in his retirement, and hopefully he can stay in baseball in some way as he moves forward.

Not only was Mr. Pedroia injured this week in the WBC, but also Youkilis was injured while on the team too. It’s getting to be a big issue for the team, because if you lose two players during the process of games that don’t matter for the actual MLB world. The Red Sox really wanted to burst out of the gate this spring when the season actually begins, but they are also in a bit of a tough situation, because they will be starting out only with some backup players in the field. Neither of their injuries seem to be really bad nor long-lasting, but it’s going to be annoying not to start off the season without the full team in place. It’s going to be a rough time for them but they will try to start off as well as possible otherwise.

Dustin Pedroia was playing in the World Baseball Classic over the last few weeks and ended up with a little bit of a problem. He strained some muscles in his abdomen and seems to be needing to sit out for awhile. This, of course, caused an uproar about the WBC. The WBC isn’t worth anything in the MLB season, and the team is beginning to worry about whether the competition is worth anything. My opinion: yeah, it stinks that he’s hurt. But he’s a baseball player. Many of them play through injuries. He could have been just as injured in batting practice. It’s not like these players are children or anything either. Just let him play and take care of him when he’s hurt. It’s not the world’s fault.

Clay Buchholz has pitched really well in his first outing of the spring training. He pitched 3 perfect innings despite the team not winning in the end. He’s aiming to be in the pitching rotation this year, but it’s not certain that he’ll make it. Then again, we can be sure that he’s going to work hard at it. And besides, with 3 perfect innings, it’s going to be a fun time watching him try. I’m looking forward to reading more about him and if we can get that to happen, it’s going to be a great year. I think he’s going to be really strong, but we’ll see what happens over the next few weeks.

In terms of pitchers, one of the most consistent that the Red Sox has is Brad Penny. He’s been having shoulder trouble recently though, so the team is hoping that he’ll be ready for the beginning of the season, or possibly even sometime over the course of spring training. The pitching coach, Jon Farrell, said that he has been pitching on a secondary part of the field, rather than a regular mound. Putting him down on regular ground, rather than on the raised mound, is better for him, says the pitching coach, because he ends up getting more of his lower body involved in the throw, relieving some of the pressure on the shoulder. And he hasn’t reported any real pain in the shoulder since he started that. Hopefully he can keep that up and stay healthy.

The Red Sox may not be the best team in the league, though they certainly are one of the best. But how good are they for your fantasy baseball decisions. There are certainly a lot of different players who are good on this team. Nowadays, the Sox have remained a lot better in the last few years than people may have expected. As for offensive players, last year the team was a little bit lower than expected, though, because they were injured during the course of the year. But there are quite a few impressive players who have been able to hit well last season and will most likely become even better in 09. So the bottom line is that there are a lot of players you should think about for your fantasy team this year.