the best Sox off-day ever.

SATURDAY'S GAME
1. i didn't realize the Red Sox had improved to second best fielding percentage in the American League!

2. i just love saying this: Mike Lowell has the best fielding percentage for a third baseman -- of all time!

3. ok, one more stat & then i'll stop: Pedroia Pocket is the second toughest guy to strike out in the American League! how's that for something i never saw coming, right up there with his third best team batting average.

4. Tim McCarver finally said something worth hearing (hey, it was bound to happen sometime, with the odds of probability & all) about pitching the knuckleball: "you need the fingers of a safe cracker and the zen of a Buddhist to throw it."

5. not only does he just seem able to pitch into infinity, but ageless Wakey sprinted to catch a foul pop for an out in the fifth inning.

6. observation: Bobby Kielty is the anti-WMP.

7. still loving Cash catching Wake.

8. Uribe (for the Other Sox) has a really uncomfortable looking batting stance.

9. it feels like Christmas that the Red Sox actually managed to bring bats three games in a row.

10. Yankees win. steady at six-and-a-half games in the AL East.

SUNDAY'S GAME
1. this was the first game of the series i was forced to watch WGN. MLBtv showed NESN for both Friday games. Saturday was on FOX. someone needs to get these announcers a pronunciation cheat sheet. Julian opts to use the J in his name, so it's said the way it looks, not HOO-lian. and it's pronounced "Kelty" (the way he said it when he read the line up on Saturday & introduced himself), not "Key-elty."

2. one more thing: i feel the need to point out that in an all Sox series, you can't really say "the Sox" & expect it to be definitive. for instance "leading off in the Sox half of the inning..." yeah ummm... one would imagine. =P

3. about time JD Drew hit a home run & earned a little bit of that disgustingly large contract...

4. ...ya know, something like Kielty, who has been a big-league Red Sock for all of a week and already hit a home run. maybe *he* would like to play right field for us...?

5. four appearances now without a run given up! go Gagne! =)

6. (not rubbing it in Dan, i promise...) i am stunned the Red Sox scored double digits in four consecutive games. i didn't think our offense had it in them this season, never mind the ability to score late in games. offense finally coming together? please?

7. Yankees lose. seven-and-a-half. Sox off Monday, but the Yankees give it one more go-round in Detroit. worst case scenario, we meet in the Bronx with seven games between us.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

so. tomorrow i get on a plane & head West for my vacation. i will miss game one of the Sox-Yankees series. i *never* miss a Sox-Yankees game. no doubt, when i land, the first text Nichole & Daniel will get will inform them that i have landed safely, and the next will ask what happened in the game. (and the best part is, they totally get why this is *that* important!) the people sitting around me will hate me before we even finish our taxi down the runway for take off. the first pitch of the game is scheduled to happen just about the time we begin to board. i'm going to be fidgeting, wondering & agonizing over what's happening in the game, for a five-plus hour flight. the pitching match ups are intense: Matsuzaka/Pettite. Joshy/Rog-ah. Schill/Wang. *anything* can happen.

please let our pitching stay hot. please let the bats have been packed when we left Chicago. please let the momentum from the weekend carry over. and please let the day off not have done more harm than good.

it helps that the EE just suffered the worst road shut out in their history, 16-0, on get-away night in Detroit. eight games up. eight is a nice number.