We lost, in "new classics" fashion: Game we easily could have won that frustrates the fuck out of you and keeps you up really late. And as Youk's ball was caught with the tying run on second in deep right to end our game, I flipped to the Yanks to see Jeter get on as the go-ahead run with his usual cheapie to right. He's like a kid who found a glitch in a video game. I imagine him as a kid playing Nintendo Baseball and discovering that if you run back and forth between the bases, you'll eventually move out of the base line, and will be able to circle the bases without the computer team tagging you. At that point you can score endlessly, and beat the computer 100-0 if you want. All right, so I used to do it, too. But I don't go around doing that shit in real life.

But it didn't work! Fortunately, A-Rod came up with two on and two out, so naturally he struck out to end the ninth. Then the M's got a walkoff homer. The intellectually challenged Bobby Murcer somehow couldn't detect that the ball was very clearly over the wall. As Beltre trotted in with the winning run, he said "and it's gonna be called a home run..." Yeah, because it was a home run. Face it, they lost. He then assumed it must have hit off Abreu's glove. Nope. Just over the wall for a home run.

The other contenders lost, so if you're thinking Wild Card, we're still 4 back, and still 6.5 back of Moneybags McGee.

I was thinking, maybe if we start using mulch and fertilizer and twigs and start building relief pitchers. The earth-people would surely do better than what we've got.

Pedroia played tonight. Got a hit. Good to finally meet you, little one. Another guy we've heard about since he was just a glint in Pawtucket's eyes.

Hey, I have a suggestion. If a guy goes to intentionally walk you, why not swing and miss at the first pitch. See what the opposing manager does then. Still holding up four? Swing at the second pitch. That's like cutting off the opposing manager's pinky finger at the knuckle. After that, he'll tell you if he wears ladies' underwear. We can see what kind of guts Torre has, facing Manny with two free strikes against him.

I hate how we had Coco steal in the ninth, effectively taking the bat out of Ortiz' hands. Again. TJ. I know you can argue for it in that situation, but I say do what you can to not open up first base with David coming up.

Finally, I'm definitely not down with this whole "the Yanks dominated us, and are the best team in baseball" thing. We stunk enough for them to win all five games this weekend. That doesn't make them some great team in my eyes. They started Johnny Carson tonight. Something like that. And the rest of their pitching, well, it's not winning them the World Series. I'd definitely put money on that. (I watch the Yanks almost every game. I'm not just assuming stuff.) Then again, there are a lot of crappy teams in this league, that the Yanks can easily beat. But we should beat those teams, too. It doesn't look like it now, that we could beat the RHS 1992 JV baseball team. I honestly believe Ted White could take Hansen deep. But it is baseball, there are crappy teams that are out of the race that even a bed-shitting Sox team should beat, so I'm not giving up yet. Then again, I never do. Whatever. I'm obviously never giving up on this team if I'm sitting here writing about them at 2 AM, a day after they lost five effing games in a row, at home, to Donald F. Dunbar, III.

My girlfriend was asking me if I think the Sox appreciate us who stay to the end of games like the one Sunday night (which I did stay til the end of). Well, I don't think they can help but notice that tonight, after what happened on the weekend, going to California, and hearing loud "Let's Go Red Sox" chants all game long. So, they appreciate it. I think... their next step is, you know, ending the losing. The repeated losing.