Red Sox Pospect Ryan Westmoreland ILL

My thanks to the Boston Globe for making me aware of this. The name Ryan Westmoreland might not be familiar to you but it is to the Boston Red Sox and their players. He is a 19 year old super prospect who right now is in the beginning stages of the fight of his life. After experiencing headaches and other health oddities, tests revealed that he suffers from a "cavernous malformation" of weak blood vessels in his BRAIN STEM. The brain stem is the center of everything that makes us human beings and because of that, the procedure he will undertake today (they're not wasting any time) might, God forbid, be complicated by the malformation's location and serious and severe neurological consequences might result. He's only 19 years old. It's not fair. Boston manager Terry Francona had this to say...

“I’m going to be very respectful of what they (Ryan and his family) are going through,’’ he said. “I would hope that everybody else would be, too.’’

The Red Sox convinced him to join the club with a $2 million signing bonus. Jon Lester and Mike Lowell, cancer survivors (this is NOT cancer), have been through it all and know how much help the Boston-affiliated medical people were. Here's Jon...

“He’s definitely in a good organization as far as doctors and people that’ll take care of him, said Lester, who overcame anaplastic large cell lymphoma. “As far as that goes, we've got a lot of good resources here.’’

That we do, Jon. I'm sure we all wish Ryan the best and we have to hope he comes out of this dangerous foray into his brain unscathed. Good luck and God bless, Ryan.

Josh Beckett was scratched from Sunday's 6-4 Red Sox victory over the Minnesota Twins. Reliever Ryne Miller started the contest in his place and gave up three first inning runs. Hey, the Good Guys won and Beckett will pitch at the end of the week on his normal day. Here's Tito...

''He'll pitch again on his normal day,'' Francona said of Beckett. ''It might cost him getting stretched out by one inning. He wasn't feeling well. He'll just stay right on his schedule. The biggest thing is for him to get himself better.''

Team captain Jason Varitek played in his first spring game after taking care of his ailing wife. It must have been nice to see him back in there. He said this...

''You're getting your body acclimated to playing along with seeing a lot of new arms,'' Varitek said. ''That was a little bit different. You try to kind of be a little more aware.''

The biggest question the club has RIGHT NOW is this...what's going on with Daisuke Matsuzaka and when will he return? But we're in good hands with Timmy Wakefield as our number five guy. Clay Buchholz looked great in his Saturday start and we all know numbers one through three could ALL be aces. We're in good shape...so far.

We start another new week with a middle-of-the-month Monday. Make the best of it. One month until tax time. I know I'm not getting a refund so I'll file mine in early April. Click on this post's title to be zapped to the Boston Herald Red Sox home page and as always, BE WELL. Thanks for stopping in and leave a comment if you can. See ya!