This just in…Mike Lowell is NOT old!

Mike Lowell –  2006 Photo taken by MEApparently it was a slow baseball news day on Sunday because Sunday night CHB wrote that piece of crap mocking Curt and the fans and Tony Massarotti used around 340 words to tell us that Mike Lowell isn’t old.

Great news!  I slept like a baby last night knowing that!

Now, I know that I complain about the sports writers in Boston, a lot, and this is probably just nitpicking.    But there are many, MANY stories to be found at spring training.   I enjoy a good, light-hearted story as much as anyone.   "Good" being the operative word here.   Seriously, at this point in spring training, do the writers just give up?   Here is what Tony’s piece would have looked like without the quotes he got from Mike Lowell:

 In the case of David Ortiz, for instance, people are frequently surprised to learn that he looks considerably thinner in person. In the case of Mike Lowell, the veteran third baseman encounters a similar reaction.

Now entering his 13th season of professional baseball and ninth in the major leagues, Lowell turned 33 last month. When the Sox acquired him in the November 2005 trade with the Marlins that also brought Josh Beckett to the Sox, Lowell looked precisely as he does now – tall and thin with more than his share of salt and pepper.Though born in Puerto Rico, Lowell was raised in the United States and assures he is what his birth certificate says he is. He’s regarded as a respected team leader, another fact that only leads many to believe that Lowell is older than one might guess.

That’s also a way of saying he has maturity beyond his years.

Here’s where Tony really gets stuck.  He needs an ending for his piece so he NEEDS to use another quote by Mike about how he’s NOT old.  So this is what he uses:

“There’s a stereotype, I think. Some guys think that if you’re young, you have to be immature.”

Good quote, actually.  I like it.  Too bad Tony follows it up, and ends the piece with:

Or that you have to look like a fawn.

The hell?  A fawn?  Where the hell did that come from?  And why is Tony so cranky about people assuming Lowell is a year or two older than he is?  Lowell is obviously not bothered by this.  I don’t get it.

He could have written a good piece about Mike Lowell.  About how, after being considered a tag-along to the Josh Beckett deal, he turned out to be better for the team last year than Beckett.  About how, after a bad spring training, Lowell became so hot that he lead the league in doubles, earning him the nickname "Mr. Double" from a vast majority of internet Red Sox fans. 

There are a lot of untapped stories in Mike Lowell.  "Gee, he LOOKS old but he really ISN’T" isn’t high up on the list of them for me.