the house of pain on Yawkey Way

photos from Yahoo Sports

1. poor Wakey. that knuckleball was all Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde on him all night. a nine-pitch 123 first. some kind of insane door to hell opened in the second. back to sailing along in the third. and then the fourth inning happened like something out of a horror flick. truthfully, Tito should have pulled Wake out of his misery long before he did. no amount of run support was going to save Wakey last night.

2. what the heck is the deal with Boston leaving the bases loaded so often?! jeez almighty. the idea is *not* to just get on base, but to do something with it when you do. five runs on *thirteen* hits. not to mention the two batters walked & the two hit by pitches. that's seventeen guys on base & only five could make it home? like the old saying goes, boys: waste not, want not.

3. scary moment when Mike Lowell took a pitch on his left hand. he ended up leaving the game, but xrays were negative. he's going to have one heck of a bruise there though, i bet. that's the same hand he broke in 2003. the idea of him being out of the line up for any amount of time... ::shudder::

4. Youk consecutive game hit streak: 23

5. and here we go. JD Drew out with a strained right hammy. no DL for him. yet. but i suppose it's just a matter of time now.

6. Pedroia Pocket went 3-for-4 last night. he's on quite a tear these days.

7. so we juggled the starting rotation around, bumping Julian to Monday's game in Oakland. i do have to wonder. Wake has really not had it when we play the Yankees this year. Tavarez, on the other hand, is 2-o against Satan's Minions. why then did we opt to subject Wake to torture tonight? why didn't we pitch Julian instead? you know, if we were jumbling up the rotation & all.

8. there were no fewer than *five* batters hit by pitches last night. (hmmm... maybe it's a *good* thing Julian won't be taking his spot after Wakefield at any point in this series now...) Wang hit Lowell. Wakefield hit Phelps. Snyder hit A-Rod. and then Lopez accidentally hit Cano. i say accidentally, because when you're down by six runs in the top of the ninth & you've worked an 0-2 count, the last thing you want to do is give the Yankees a free base. bottom of the ninth, what does Scott Proctor do? he plunks Youk. caught Youk on the shoulder, but if he hadn't pulled back out of the way. that ball would have clipped him right on the head. understandably, Youk was furious.

Posada held him back from charging Proctor on the mound, but that was looking suspiciously intentional & Proctor got tossed. i know i've pleaded in the past not to hit Youk with anymore pitches, but taking aim at someone's head just is not cool.

oh yeah. Torre probably would have been ejected as well, but he had already been sent to his room earlier in the game when he got confrontational with the 3B umpire.


9. after Lowell was pulled from the game, Youk slid over to cover third. that was where he committed his first error for 2007. he remains errorless on his "home turf" over at 1B. he really does not get enough credit for the role he plays on this team, on both sides of the ball.

10. stupid Yankees whooped up on us but good. 9-5.

11. Schill & Mussina already faced off today but those thoughts will have to wait til tomorrow. because that's just the way we roll around here. i need to look for photos & all and those don't get posted til the day after the game. so there you have it.