Sports Redux: Another Near Sweep

The Red Sox came ohsoclose to sweeping the Yankees out of the picture in New York last week. And they came, well, not quite so close this weekend, as good Chicago hitting and a dearth of run support for Tim Wakefield doomed the boys to a 4-2 loss to the White Sox at Fenway.

Wake gave up a first-inning homer to Jim Thome (now tied with Mickey Mantle on the all time list for home runs, if not whiskey sours). In the bottom of the first, the Sox loaded the bases, then watched Jason Bay line out and leave everyone stranded. It was that kind of afternoon.

Coming into the ninth down 4-1, the Sox scratched out a run against Chicago closer Bobby Jenks. They had two on, two out, and Dustin Pedroia, who's been hitting everything in sight lately, at the plate. You couldn't ask for a better scenario. Alas. Dustin flew out to left, and that was that. "I don’t think it was a healthy win for me," said White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen in a remarkably @#$*-free postgame commentary. "[Pedroia]'s got a heart bigger than anybody in this league."

Paul Byrd takes the hill tonight as the Orioles come in for three. Meanwhile, Tampa Bay won (we just cut and paste that every day now), and John Kruk says that, contrary to what everyone thinks, the Rays aren't going away. Well, we'll see. They'll be at Fenway next week for the biggest series in their franchise history.

Julio Lugo was back in the Dominican Republic to settle a dispute about some land, which we hear legally tranfers to Jed Lowrie along with Lugo's old job. It's important that justice be served, so Julio, stay down there as long as you need to sort things out.

The Patriots signed John Lynch to shore up their secondary...well...not so fast. He was one of the players cut to make roster room for this weekend's opener. They could and probably will resign him later on. "As has been the case in other situations, I would not rule anything out down the road," said Coach Bill, who could embroider that into a sampler at this point.

Sports Illustrated's Don Banks thinks the Chargers will win the Super Bowl, which doesn't make sense, because he even notes in the column that Norv Turner is still their coach. Weird.