Sportsfrog.com

Not a good outing for the Red Sox import yesterday, underscored by the circus that will follow him wherever he goes this year. His hittable cheese was witnessed by:

—Stephen King
—Peter Gammons (feverishly working up ways to spin the bad outing, I am sure)
—Patriots emmisaries
—a crew from NBC Nightly News
—most of Japan

So, Matsuzaka, what say you to your part in the carnage?

“‘I thought I’d take the opportunity to experiment a little bit,’ Matsuzaka said calmly through translator Masa Hoshino. ‘See where they’re going to hit the ball, see where they wouldn’t hit it. The third and fourth inning, I was definitely experimenting….The fact that they hit a couple of home runs off me is not something I’m terribly worked up about. There will be times I get hit and they score runs against me. Speaking psychologically, I’m not overly concerned about that.”

Oh. That’s um, pretty damn level-headed. I will take that as an early indication he will be able to handle the rather intense spotlight as the year unfolds.