Cubs ship OF Marlon Byrd to the struggling Red Sox.

After the Red Sox imploded they made a deal today to acquire Marlon Byrd to play outfield for them. Byrd is hitting .070 with a .149 on base percentage. After watching the Sox give up 15 unanswered runs, after going up 9-0 to the Yankees, it looks like he’ll fit in nicely with Bobby Valentine’s miscast bunch of misanthropes. The Sox gave up Michael Bowden, a solid reliever and a player to be named later for Byrd and cash considerations, heard to be covering most of his prorated remaining salary of $6.5 million.

The Sox are hapless and this is not going to help them. Bowden was stellar in the minors last season and did well in a small sample size after his call up. With the way the bullpen disintegrated yesterday the Sox could have used a good reliever. Carl Crawford is out for a few more weeks at least with his injury and Ellsbury might be out until the break, but the question remains, is Marlon Byrd better than what they have out there?

Here’s what Ben Cherrington said, “Our pitching performance has to improve. That’s the bottom line. There are a lot of different things that go into that. There are different ways to improve and we’ve got to look at all those ways.” Yet, this is right after they trade away a pitcher.

I would institute a rule in that organization that no one trades with Theo Epstein or Jed Hoyer any longer. Ben Cherrington is being overruled on every move by Larry Lucchino and John Henry. Theo had some pull in that clubhouse, but now it’s in disorder and this is the second week of the season.

These Sox have lost five straight home games. The Boston faithful aren’t used to losing anymore and if they want to avoid another Bobby Valentine’s Day Massacre they better acquire pitching, because they’re going nowhere fast.