Travis Shaw Named BoSox Third Bagman, Sandoval to Rot On the Bench.

Baseball is an evil, evil game man. Two years ago Pablo was the tits of the town, a borderline face of the MLB and a fan favorite for more than just Giants' fans. I remember watching Game 1 of the 2012 Series and Pablo was hitting balls that were at his toes over the fence with ridiculous ease. I'm not sure if it's just Boston that's been killing superstar careers over the past five years or if Pablo just lost his ability to stay in shape and hit the baseball. I would say it's the weight, but Sandoval has always been a big guy and before he lost that chunk of weight in 2011 he was just as big if not bigger than he is now but still performing at an extremely high level. This had to be a really tough call to make for manager John Farrell, as the Red Sox paid a hefty price for Pablo and invested a lot of trust in his ability to hit consistently for average year in and year out. That hasn't been the case for the Panda, who adopted the nickname in San Fran because of his surprising agility for a rather big fellow, ever since he arrived in Boston, and it seems that at this point Pablo Sandoval's career has hit an all-time low.

Regardless, this is no doubt the right decision coming from the Sox. Travis Shaw has been an extremely pleasant surprise after the numbers he put up out of nowhere last year and the way he's been tearing the seams off the ball this spring, not to mention in my opinion he plays a way better third base than Sandoval does. Hopefully for Shaw he takes advantage of the promotion and starts to settle nicely into that starting spot, because I really enjoy watching the way this guy swings the bat and his surprising range for a primary first baseman switching hot corners. Definitely a bittersweet day for baseball fans, as it's always a shame to see a former superstar completely fall of the face of the earth, but sweet in the sense that we get to see a guy who most thought wouldn't even make it to the bigs get a real shot at making a name for himself, which is always exciting to watch unfold.

Four more days, wish I could fast forward so hard right now.

P.S. Obviously wouldn't mind seeing Travis Shaw completely choke on this opportunity and leave the Sox without a viable option at third base, but that's just the Yankees fan coming out in me.