there’s no doubt in my mind that he has been a huge help for us this year and especially in the latest red sox series. However, if any of you ever watched all the red sox games, you’d know that J.D. never gave up an at-bat with them, especially an at-bat in a situation against Papelbon with a chance to drive in a gametying run with an out. He may not have gotten the job done every time for them, but he never went down strike 1 strike 2 strike 3 in a big at-bat or nearly any at-bat for that matter, which ive seen quite a bit of this year.

I’m with you both. He’s been good for us this year, both on the field and in front of the reporters. He makes the team a bit more fun to root for. While I hated the “Idiots” I have to say that it’s nice to see someone smiling all the time while they play the game.

Minor tangent – I had the pleasure of speaking with Buster Olney in a one-on-one conversation a few months ago and he said that his three favorite Yankees when he was a beat reporter were David Cone, Paul O’Neill, and Tim Raines. He liked those three guys more than anyone else because they always stayed in the clubhouse after losses and made the writers’ jobs easy. They answered questions, they took responsibility for their actions, they never tried to blame anyone else for failures, etc. Olney said that Damon reminds him of those guys in that way. He’s always taking pressure off his teammates by answering all the questions and making himself accessible.

Huge ditto here.

Pitching issues aside, has Damon been a godsend or what? This guy has done nothing but eliminate doubters. I respected him, but now I’m just a fan.