WAKEFIELD!!!

Tim Wakefield started the first game of today's twin bill, which is now in a rain delay in the bottom of the 7th inning. I cannot say enough about this man! Total class act both on and off the field for starters, but he certainly still has his best stuff on the mound! After flirting with a perfect game for 5 innings and a no-no for almost 8 last week at Oakland, he follows that with another gem today: 7 IP, 5 H's, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K's. This leaves him with an ERA of 2.45!

Hopfully this performance will quiet all the Wake naysayers once and for all.

Now for bright spots on offense: 6 of the 9 starters today have at least 2 hits, with Drew and Lowell each getting 3 apiece so far. 3 hits for Lowell? That means he's raised his BA about 150 points or so in the past week, to a nice .315! Papi's bat has come to life as well with two hits today. He's raised his average a good 50 points this week. Winter question marks answered!

Nick Green is swinging a hot bat with a 2B and a HR today, but I think he may be using Lugo's old glove, as he has 2 errors today, too.

The game is in a rain delay at the moment, with another game scheduled for later today. Both the Sox and the Twins have Thursday off. The Sox will stay at home for a series with the Yankees starting on Friday. The Twins will be heading off to CLE for a series starting on Friday. Weather.com calls for showers and rain for the rest of the day in Boston, so it remains to be seen whether or not ball will resume today, or whether or not any games will be made up on Thursday.

UPDATE: The game was called after a 1:25 delay.

SOX WIN 10-1 BOX SCORE

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Mother Nature: "Psyche!"

That's just the way it goes in baseball sometimes.

Baseball gets rain delays and postponements. Football? Phpffphtt! No way! (Don't forget they only play 16 regular season games.) Baseball is different. Even the parks are of different dimensions from one to the next. But one of the biggest differences is that 2 teams could play 4 & 1/2 innings, and if the umpires and Mother Nature deemed it so, that partial game could be completely wiped off the books and started over again. Can you imagine the ugly howl that would have emanated from the bowels of the Evil Empire had the rain continued last night, wiping out a Yankee 13-4 lead?! Ol' dumbass Hank would have complained to the commissioner, weather.com, the governor, GW, and Jesus Christ himself had the umps called last nights game! You don't hear the Sox whining about resuming play or why it rained today and didn't rain enough last night.

Given the history between these two team, a thought did cross the back of my mind when the Sox had scored 3 runs in the bottom of the 9th and were threatening to score more. I thought, "I suppose it is within the realm of possibility that the Sox could score 15 runs in one inning." (I wonder how many Yank fans were thinking the same thing~ grin/snicker/chuckle.) A basketball team could be down by 15 points with 45 seconds left on the clock and you know there is no way to make up the difference (unless the opposition walks off the court.) In football, you could be down by 15 with less than a 45 seconds to go and the same scenario ensues. But in baseball, highly unlikely as it may be, it still could happen. Actually, the Sox scored 17 runs in one inning against Detroit on 18 June, 1953, 7th inning. (This being the MLB record of the modern era.)

These are just some of the differences that make this such a great game.

And that's just the way it goes in baseball.

(Get used to it, Hank.)

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Fun Things To Do during a rain delay. .

1.) text all your friends, tell them you miss them

2.) give your significant other (if with you) that much needed backrub

3.) Buy a round!!!

4.) Sing Take Me Out To The Ball Game  

5.) Sing that song again in SPANISH

6.) Buy a round!!!

7.) talk about just how dern cool Oregon is

8.) play "guess the age of the people in your section"

9.) BUY ANOTHER ROUND (to make up for the ages you guessed wrong)

10.) when in doubt, start the YOUUUUUUKKKK Chant!

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Papelbon Finds A New Way to Embarrass Himself

Jonathan Papelbon seems to have too much time on his hands; this season we have seen him embarrass himself at Mike Lowell's Dancing With The Stars fund raiser and we saw him get national headlines for his comments about the Rays. During last night's rain delay a video was aired of Papelbon dancing and lip syncing "Blame it on the Rain" with Manny Delcarmen and Wally and some mystery guy on drums. Watch it below:

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Tarp is On the Field In the 8th

The Red Sox lead 4-3 with 2 outs in the top of the 8th. A-Rod is up and Papelbon had just been called in before the game was halted. Based on the radar below it should get back underway quickly.

Update: the tarp is coming off the field.

Update 2: the tarp is back on before a pitch, Papelbon has had to warm up twice. We'll see if it has any adverse effects or if he enters the game at all.

Update 3: The tarp is off, the game is on FX (channel 36 on Comcast Bay Area) now due to the NACAR race on Fox

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