Darrin Beene is entering his seventh year at The News Tribune, having covered the Tacoma Rainiers in 2005 and Major League Baseball for two years before that. Beene, a former assistant sports editor at The News Tribune, also worked for the Los Angeles Daily News and Los Angeles Times. He lives in the South Sound with his wife and two children.
This blog is about baseball in general but specifically the Seattle Mariners and the Mariners’ Triple-A team, the Tacoma Rainiers. It will contain news, analysis, answers to your questions and audio reports.
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This just in from the Associated Press:
Boston Red Sox rookie left-hander Jon Lester (Bellarmine Prep) has a form of lymphoma and will start treatment in the coming week, the team announced Friday.
Enlarged lymph nodes were identified when Lester, 22, was tested to determine the cause of back pain that sent him to the disabled list last Monday. The club said Friday he has a treatable form of anaplastic large cell lymphoma.
Manager Terry Francona visited Lester on Thursday morning and several players commented later that day, before the diagnosis was announced.
Lester is 7-2 with a 4.76 ERA and 60 strikeouts in 81 1-3 innings.
Lester was called up to the majors for the first time June 10, when he started in a 7-4 loss to Texas. He wasn’t involved in the decision. He improved to 5-0 with a 1-0 victory at Kansas City on July 18.
On Thursday, reliever Mike Timlin said baseball pales in significance to Lester’s health.
“It’s his life. It’s not him not being able to get out of the sixth inning,” Timlin said. “He’s 22. That’s a long future not to have if you come up with an illness that you can’t get rid of so we are praying for him.”
“Winning baseball games, yeah, that’s great. Losing baseball games, no, that’s not very much fun. But dealing with horrible things in human life, that’s a whole lot worse than losing.”
Lester was Boston’s first pick in the 2002 draft. In his first four minor-league seasons, he had a 24-22 record with a 3.38 ERA in 73 games, 69 of them starts, and was considered one of the Red Sox top prospects.
Last year with Double-A Portland he had an 11-6 record and led the Eastern League with a 2.61 ERA.
This season with Triple-A Pawtucket, he was 3-4 with a 2.70 ERA in 11 starts before being promoted.
