Ponderous thoughts I was pondering ...

Alex Cora fiddles while the Red Sox burn. Could be time for a change.

Ponderous thoughts I was pondering while grumbling over forecasts that this will be the 11th straight weekend with rain on its way:

** It's been more than 35 years since I last covered a baseball game at Fenway Park as a sportswriter, and probably about 25 years since I last set foot in the ballpark save for two Thanksgiving weeks ago, when the King Philip Warriors and Franklin Panthers played their annual football rivalry game there on the Tuesday before the holiday (KP won, 35-0).

So I admit, my insight into the Red Sox is completely pedestrian in nature. I'm just another guy sitting in the recliner before the 48-inch TV (I upgraded from 40 last year, but anything larger would not fit in my living room). But I'm not at all hesitant in telling you that this team is absolutely infuriating me.

These Red Sox should be a lot better than they are. No question about it. But right now, as they find themselves 11 games behind in the loss column to the flawed Yankees in the AL East, I want to throw things at the new big-screen in frustration at their miserable lack of consistency ... and maybe even an accompanying lack of cojones. 

Their fielding is suspect. Their pitching is inconsistent at its best, and downright undependable at its worst. They make stupid baserunning mistakes. They have no idea how to close out games that would be wins. And worst of all, they just can't fucking hit the ball. They put 19 runs on the scoreboard in a win over the Orioles on May 23, and have scored a total of 15 runs in five games since.

And all the while, manager Alex Cora goes before the cameras with a blank stare in his eyes and says, "We have to be better," and so on -- his delivery mirroring the total lack of motivation that his team shows every time it can't hold a 1-run lead going into the ninth inning.

I was a big Cora fan at the start of his tenure with the Sox, and was pleased he returned after he served his suspension for his minor role in the Houston Astros' cheating scandal. But the miserable finishes of the team over the past few years and the overwhelming mediocrity of this team are just pissing me off. This team is stagnant, no matter what moves it seems to make -- and often, those moves don't really make sense.

There are a few areas of major concern that are particularly maddening.

Garrett Crochet: Is he Chris Sale 2.0?

For one, free agency signings seem to get the kiss of death once they step off the plane at Logan. Chris Sale was an injury-ridden bust during his time here, and now he's regained his Cy Young pitching form in Atlanta. Infielder Trevor Story appeared heading along that same path, and now, even though he's in the lineup, he can't hit his weight. Ditto Alex Bregman, who got off to a great start -- and yup, there goes his quad. 

And how many more terrific pitching performances by Garrett Crochet can they squander before he becomes Chris Sale 2.0?

Another concern of mine is how many young players are being jerked around and told to play different positions at a time in their careers when too much disruption could turn them into the baseball version of Mac Jones. And it's all because Raffy Devers won't play in the field. Sure, he has actually put up some decent numbers as the DH lately, but his petulance to play either third or first put a growing cancer in the clubhouse.

The fielding lapses just irritate the hell out of me, too. I like Jarren Duran, but that line drive that just fell out of his glove in Milwaukee was the kind of outfield defense that I used to play when I was literally the worst player in the Hockomock League. And the way the Red Sox throw the ball all over the infield haphazardly and allow runners to advance? That has no business happening in the major leagues.

Maybe it's just time for a change. Maybe it's time to clean house in the coaching and training staffs to put people in the jobs that will instill fire in their players' bellies and keep them healthy enough to do something about it. 

Do you think Jordon Hudson would let Bill Belichick coach a baseball team?

All I can say is, "they're ruinin' my summah ..." and it hasn't even begun yet.

** I don't know which is the better burn, but these two recent developments in Trump World have warmed my heart with the potential they have for getting under the Orange Turd's skin.

First came the news that Wall Street investors are calling Trump's policy on tariffs "TACO" -- for "Trump Always Chickens Out." In just a few short hours, that phrase has become the dominant comment on social media.

And right up there is the news that Pope Leo XIV, a Chicago native, will televise a special Mass to be shown to tens of thousands of Chicagoans on the message board at Rate Field (otherwise to me, the new Comiskey Field) on June 14, Trump's birthday and the day on which he wants a massive military parade in Washington. The Mass will likely be shown live on American television.

Both are priceless.

** Nothing still prompts me to turn off the radio faster, after all these years, than that insipid 1-800 Kars-4-Kids jingle. I'll die before I contribute a single penny -- and yes, I will still use that phrase even though the U.S. Mint is no longer minting pennies.

** This is the time of year in which I start feeling a little lost. My work as a sports play-by-play announcer is in hiatus until September, even though several local teams have begun play in the MIAA spring tournaments. 

Locally, the King Philip baseball, softball and girls' lacrosse teams, the North Attleboro baseball team and the Bishop Feehan baseball and softball teams have the best chances to advance deeply in their respective tournament fields. Best of luck to all of the local teams, and I promise, I'll be back behind the mic for the start of the 2025-26 school year.

Oh, and a special shoutout to my hometown's softball team, the Mansfield Hornets, ranked 29th in Division 2, which advanced out of the preliminary round today with a win over No. 36 Dartmouth. Go Hornets.

** Back when I returned to The Sun Chronicle in 1989 as the "Weekend Sports Editor," following a two-year stay at The Patriot Ledger of Quincy, we may have had the most educated sports staff in all of New England. I, of course, proudly hail from Northwestern University, while Bill Stedman, then the sports editor, was a graduate of Harvard -- which I always respectfully referred to as "the Northwestern of the East."

OK, I was joking. Northwestern is a fine school, and it boasts what's universally regarded as the best journalism school in the country (the Medill School of Journalism), as well as a pretty damned fine business school (the Kellogg School of Management), a highly-respected medical school, and top-notch programs in law, engineering and technology, and the dramatic arts -- none of which would accept Donald Trump or any of his offspring. You probably didn't even know that back in the 1970s, Northwestern's computing school was one of the initial origin points for a world-wide linkup of computers that would eventually come to be known as the Internet.

These cards started the Internet.

Not that I had anything to do with that, of course. I'd just stop in there occasionally and steal a whole stack of used computer punch cards, utilized initially to input data. They were great all-purpose items, especially well-suited for sticking under a too-short leg of a chair so it would stop rocking. I was ahead of my time where recycling was concerned.

But Harvard is ... well, Harvard. It's in a class by itself. And now it finds itself in the crosshairs of Trump's vindictive quest to use "anti-semitism" (which is bullshit) as justification to force Harvard to adjust its curriculum to reflect the conservative tropes of the MAGA movement, eviscerate the school of its federal grants, and deport its large enrollment of international students -- rumored to be partially because Harvard would not admit his youngest son with those serial-killer vibes, Barron. Yes, I know Melania's spokesman claimed that isn't the case, which gives me all the more reason to believe it.

Well, as is usually the case, Trump has conveniently forgotten that he does not have the power to erase the First Amendment from the Constitution. He has made a career of acting out his petty and misinformed grievances by forcing governmental influence (or more accurately, his own personal influence) in every walk of life -- and I firmly believe he will eventually fail.

But in the meantime, I stand firmly behind the Northwestern of the East in its legal battles against this half-pint dictator. 

** You may have noticed a new look at the top of this blog. After almost 17 years, I've changed the photo at the top and the title font to give it a more recent and up-to-date look, and to reflect my new venture into electronic media.

I've been investigating an entirely new look for the blog, but I've gone through all of the templates on the hosting site and I have yet to find something that really tickles my fancy. So I just changed the top photo -- although if you're really sharp-eyed, you may notice a hint of its past.

At the upper left-hand corner, where there is a replica of one of the Patriots' championship banners hanging on the wall behind me, you may notice the letters "BF" inside the blue field. That's the old typeface for the title of the blog, and without those letters, the online version of the blog does not have an identifying title. Now, the online version will have "BF" as its title -- which could stand for a lot of things I can't print here, but it actually stands for "Blogging Fearlessly." Duh.

That may be resolved if I find a new template I like. In the meantime, I still think it was a good idea to freshen up the look a little. After all, a baby born when I started this blog would probably be entering his or her senior year in high school this year. 

** I'm still planning to re-invigorate my podcasting platforms in the next few weeks, especially now that I have more time to devote to them. But I'd also like to take some of this time to do what they call in Australia a "walkabout" ... or in my case, jumping into the ragtop, pointing it elsewhere and then heading there.

I've always loved driving, since the days when my parents would load me into the '56 Chevy for the annual 2,600-mile round-trip drive to Florida to visit my grandparents, as well as my frequent drives to and from Northwestern in my college days. Yeah, I'm older now and I have to take that into account, but I was thinking -- before all of the current North American nastiness erupted, that is -- of heading north into Canada, maybe to Montréal or maybe retracing my steps from a 1980s drive through the Maritime Provinces.

Those considerations were made, of course, before Donald Trump started this nonsense of demanding that Canada become our 51st state and then threatening to inflict all sorts of vindictive tariffs on that sovereign nation. Now, I'm not so sure.

Yes, I'd like to take a spin up there. I'd like to get back in touch with Molson and Labatt's, with Tim Hortons coffee and "viande fumee" (smoked meat) and maybe even try some poutine (never had it!). And it's not as if I am afraid of crossing the border. I don't think the Canadian border guards will be hostile. They, like most of their brethren, are generally polite, almost to a fault. They've also probably heard lots of Americans tell them, "I didn't vote for the son of a bitch!" and so on.

The true north, strong and free.

It may also help that I am fond of wearing a small flag pin on the collar of my polo shirts, a faithful representation of the maple leaf in all its glory. I've worn those since I used to make frequent "beer runs" to Montréal back in the 1970s, bringing back multiple cases of the high-test Molson Brador brew (8.5 percent alcohol) in those little squatty bottles you don't see anymore. I wasn't smuggling; I always paid the duty fee at the U.S. border.

No, I'm more afraid of coming back to my native land. I have no idea if Trump has replaced the border guards with his neo-Gestapo ICE thugs, and if the sight of the flag pin and one half-empty Tim Hortons cup is going to get me thrown into an El Salvadorian gulag.

If I do make the trip, I intend to bring along my mixing board and a new laptop computer, and I should be able to put together some "on the road" podcasts with some new technology. Those might come in handy if I'm processed for deportation as an undesirable upon re-entering Highgate Springs, Vt.

** And finally, some of you may recall my old friend Jackie Pepper, who served as a reporter and sports anchor for NBC Sports Boston and NECN back in the 2000s. Barely 5 feet tall, but feisty and enthusiastic in her work, no one could burrow her way through a scrum of reporters to get right to the source of the group interview better than Peps. 

My friend Jackie Pepper.

The Boston TV market has always been volatile, especially in the cable realm, so Jackie returned to her native Los Angeles and held a variety of positions, including at TMZ and KNBC, before landing a great job as a senior video producer for Yahoo! Sports, where she won a prestigious Edward R. Murrow Award for her work.

Part of what gave Jackie the confidence and energy to excel in life was her association in her youth with Camp JCA Shalom in Malibu and the Shalom Institute. The organization operates a camp, conference and retreat center, focused upon instilling Jewish values, promoting sustainability principles and practices, and being welcoming and inclusive to people of all ages and abilities.

As I have gotten to know Jackie a lot better since her brief tenure in Boston ended, I have learned just how much she treasured her experiences at the camp, and the bonds she forged there. Truly, the friendships she made there have lasted a lifetime, and the lessons she learned made her one of the most confident and personable individuals I have met in the sports media.

But the camp faced a severe challenge to its very existence when, on Nov. 9, 2018, one of the most destructive wildfires to leave a charred path through the southern California landscape destroyed more than 95 percent of the buildings on the Malibu campus. The institute amazingly had most of its programs operating at other sites within four months of the fire, and then it embarked upon the effort to rebuild.

Jackie has made the full commitment to help. Since February, she has been a full-time development associate for the Shalom Institute, and today she put a post on social media that included links to a story about how new facilities on the original Malibu campus are starting to open to the next generation of campers. But the work has really just begun.

I know how much that camp meant to her, and I also know how personally devastated she was when the wildfire claimed it. She's putting 100 percent of her efforts behind the quest to offer new generations the same opportunities she had to experience personal and spiritual growth. I really have to respect that.

I wouldn't ask you to reach into your wallets and contribute, as I have, if I didn't believe in the sincerity of her efforts. You can learn more about the Shalom Institute and its goals at this website: Home - Shalom Institute.

** We'll be back with more posts soon ... but hopefully, not sent out by carrier pigeon from within an El Salvadorian gulag. Cheers!

MARK FARINELLA wrote for The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro, Mass., for 42 years. You may send him cakes with hacksaws hidden inside, but not at his email address -- which is theownersbox2020@gmail.com.