He's The Man-ny!

The headline says all you have to know! Twice in the early stages of the game, Manny came to the plate--once with the bases empty in the first and an inning later with a man on--and proceeded to deposit the horsehide in the seats for the 55 thousand plus fans to scramble for the ball. His second rivaled his Volvo-sign rocket of last week at Fenway for sheer awe-inspiring power. It was truly a monster shot! With these two, he takes sole possession of 24th place on the all-time home run list, dropping the greatest first baseman ever, Lou Gehrig to the rear. He also is now the player with the third highest HR total against the 'Stripes in history. Even better, the first two: Jimmie Foxx and Teddy Ballgame also both played for the Sox. All you Yankees fans who hate the Sox, try to explain your way around that one--can't do it, can ya'.

Back to the game--as things continued to roll along, by the time the game was barely half over, the lead was seven zip, Sox. In addition to Manny, Dusty, Youk, Drew and Tek all had multi-hit games, and, just as good--the first two times Ellsbury faced Mussina, he was hit and promptly stole second base. Works just as well as successive doubles. It also keeps the pitcher on edge and doesn't allow him to maintain the full concentration he needs when facing a lineup like the one the Sox put on the field.

On the defensive side of things, Beckett was almost like the guy we got used to seeing last year. He's still probably a tiny bit behind on conditioning, but he gave the team eight solid innings, spoiled only by a three run fifth when the Yanks briefly got to him. But he recovered nicely to close out that inning before things got totally out of hand, and then continued putting up zeroes on the board through the eighth, then giving way to Papelbon for the close.

Pap let things get a bit scary, but did close out the game with his second K of the inning and we're 3-2 for the young season against the boys from the Bronx. Next time we meet them will be same place for four in early July. Hopefully, by then, we'll not just be a game up in first as we are now, but have a nice fat lead--and with Papi fully recovered from this damn slump.