Two of Three-In Toronto!!--Peter

Boy, after yesterday's nightmare, eleven zip thrashing, I figured we're back to what passes as normal for the Sox against Toronto. There wasn't a semblance of anything good for the Hub Hose--even Lester couldn't help at all. But today, after the first inning, anyway, was pretty much a different story, and, best of all, the Sox made it two of three against the Jays--in Toronto, no less!

Starting in the 3d, the Sox fought back. Sending nine men to the plate, the Sox picked up four, including Dusty's 14th homer of the year. Yoouk added an RBI on a hit in the inning as well, his 89th of the year. However, it wasn't to be easy by any means. With a single run in the 4th and a pair in the 6th, the Jays squirted back into the lead, and the Sox bats fell silent. I started to think, "Here we go again." Worse, I'm playing the game of scoreboard watching, and seeing the Stripes trampling the O's 7-2 midway through their game, while Tampa and the Chisox are going back and forth, both affecting the Sox place in the division race and the wild card at the same time.

Then, suddenly Coco turned on a 1-0 offering and drilled it into the cheaps in right to tie the score at five. It's his seventh of the year. From there on, both sides' pitchers took control of the game, allowing not much of anything. The Toronto half of the 7th, plus all of the 8th, 9th and 10th went by without more than a single scratch hit for each team. Masterson, Okajima, Papelbon and TOM-Delcarmen all pitched shutout ball through to the end of the game. Masterson gave up the only hit, while Oki finished out the 8th on just ten pitches, and Laser threw two innings of perfect baseball, allowing just two balls out of the infield. He got the 'W' after Lowrie drove a 1-1 offering deep into the right field seats for a 6-5 lead in the top of the 11th, and TOM held serve in the bottom half, allowing only a single free pass. TOM got the save for his efforts.

Although the Sox only collected nine hits over the 11 innings, four were for extra bases and three of those were homers.

It's good that the team is pulling together to hang in the two races they're involved in, because with all of the injuries, the place is starting to look like the 4077th MASH. Lowell, Wake, Lugo, Colon and Aardsma are on the DL, and JD, and JB are both hurting but hoping to work through it on a day-to-day basis. Even on day-to-day, you have to think that a herniated disc (JD) and 'numbness and tingling' in his pitching arm (JB) sound pretty serious and just what we do not need at this juncture.

On the plus side, Colon seems to be coming along and may be able to pitch in the upcoming Yankees series in NY or no later than the following one, and JB's exams and treatment are supposed to be 'making progress'. Hope that's not just blowing smoke into the nether regions of the fans' collective anatomy.

OH--the latest from your faithful scoreboard watcher: Pale Hose beat the Rays, so the Sox regain the game they lost to the Rays in the standings yesterday. The Twinkies lost; unfortunately, Mr. Hankie's Yankees managed to pull out their game, 8-7 after the O's had clawed back to a tie at seven. So that leaves us 4 1/2 behind the Rays for the division, with 32 games left; a half game up on the Chisox in the wild card and one full game up on the Twins in the wild card. The Stripes are five games to the rear.