The A's tried desperately to blow an eighth inning 6-0 lead, but they held on for a 6-4 win. With Jeter up as the tying run with two outs, I rooted for him to hit a ball that was caught at the wall. He didn't hit it that deep, but the crowd thought it was a game-tying homer, only to have it fall short, and that's good enough for me.

Note for those saying "be careful what you wish for": I'm very careful what I wish for. I want the Yankee fans to be so completely sure they're going to win, only to lose heartbreakingly, every game, for a minimum of the next 81 years. Then again, I'd take seeing them getting blown out every game and go 0-162 every year, too.

We finally win. Despite Ellsbury's continued inability to slide around a tag.

There's a palm tree in my back yard. I've always loved palm trees, and when we got a house, I looked into getting one, and found out some types of palm can live in cold temps. A few days ago, I placed my online order for a windmill palm. Today, a tree in a box showed up on our doorstep. It's a few feet tall, but most of that is the fronds. We'll see if I can keep the thing alive. Funny thing is, we were at our neighbors' house two nights ago, and I mentioned I'd ordered a palm tree, and our neighbor pointed to a palm tree of her own, ten feet from where we were sitting. But what else would you expect from a burlesque performer. So I don't even have the first palm in the neighborhood. But at least I've got someone to give me advice on how to care for the thing.

Bonus: Since everyone's talking about the fifth anniversary of that classic game/fight with Tek G-Loving A-Rod, I thought I'd link to what I wrote on this blog back when it happened. Like the rest of the posts from year one of this blog, just ignore the reference to my ex.

The 18th perfect game ever. Check out the video (muting Hawk Harrelson, of course) on that page, pretty crazy.

The NESN camera person who shows the angle from behind the plate (i.e. the one they cut to on just about every ball that's hit) is either A. new B. high or C. unfamiliar with how a baseball game is filmed. From following just the ball in flight and not allowing us to see where the fielder is (and sometimes not recovering in time to let us see the catch, like tonight) to being asleep at the wheel, keeping the camera facing straight out toward center on a ball hit down the line, this person is pissing me off at a time when I'm already pissed off. Not good.

And have you noticed that sometimes Don will do the excited "possible home run" call on a deep ball down the line even after we've all clearly seen the batter put his head down and make the decision not to run to first as if to say "I'm so sure that ball's foul I don't even need to look at it"? What's up with that? Don does a fine job, though. You know I love DO.

My baseball card magnets are selling like hotcakes! Granted, I'm referring to the type of hotcakes that sell at a slow to moderate rate, but that still counts for something. Thanks to everyone who has bought one. They're really fun to make.

So the Red Sox lose again and we're two back. I think our lineup will start bashing the ball again soon. And since the pitching really isn't doing too badly anyway, we'll start racking up the Ws again. We had a similarly shitty start to the first half, leading people to think the team had fallen to sub-.500 quality, and wouldn't recover for years, almost as if they'd never followed a sports team for a season in their entire lives (fantasy leagues don't count!). Anyway, that half worked out pretty good for us. O-Birds come to town on Friday. Don't forget to donate food or cash at the door to get an autographed picture of "your favorite Red Sox player," as NESN is saying. I have a feeling you ain't gettin' an Ortiz graph five minutes before gametime, though.

Jim Rice's number retirement day will be next Tuesday night, July 28th.

Immediately I'm seeing people on the internet "debating" this "move" by the team. Helloooo????? When Rice made the Hall, anyone with a minimum of one brain cell knew that Jim's number would be retired at Fenway at some point this season. This announcement is not, "hey, we're deciding to retire Rice's number," it's "here's the date we've chosen." Pretty simple. I've just been waiting to find out which date it would be--and fortunately I already have a ticket to that night's game. Gold.

Old Red Sox: Argenis Diaz, Hunter Something, and Julio Lugo.

New Red Sox: Adam LaRoche, and Chris Duncan.

About Duncan: praise Gedman it's not Shelley! If that psychotic ghoul ever gets called up again, it'll be brother vs. brother in Sox-Yanks games! Like the Doyles....

And LaRoche: On the radio, when we didn't yet know who we were giving up for him, they were saying something about Delcarmen. And I thought, you better get more than a .240 hitter for MDC--turns out it was indeed just minor leaguers. BUT: LaRoche, who, like Duncan, is the son of another major leaguer from my day-ish, is a great second-half hitter. Let's hope he keeps that up.

I've been in the car a lot more often lately, and that means more radio-listening. On AM radio in Providence, I get both NY and Bos sports radio. I'm keeping track of which team's fans say "holiday" when referring to Halladay the most. So far Red Sox and Yanks fans are running neck and neck at 91 percent, with Mets fans just behind at around 88 percent.

The opposite of what I hoped happened tonight. The rhino butt sniffers beat the triple-A team from Baltimore at the Easy Bake, and we lost to a rookie, even though Beckett went all nine. So we're a game back with like a thousand to play.

I was trying think of how to word my joke about the media and their "panic" talk--and sure enough, TC of all people comes on to start the post-game with the line, "panic in the Nation." Way to go, TC. Way to go for the ratings and convince those dumbasses who know only what they've witnessed in the previous series that being one game behind means the season is over. People who can watch the 2004 playoffs and then "panic" in July because the team is ONE goddamn game behind the best record in the league should be forced to have to root for the Nationals. See what 30 games out feels like. But wait, those people hardly exist, it's more just the money-grubbin' media who need to sell sell sell.

Buchholz is back in the rotation. That's because we just put Wake on the disabled list.

Beckett tonight deep in the heart, and the Yanks are throwing a guy you don't know, so I vote we move back into first place by ourselves this evening.

[Update 10:53: I'm not able to comment on any blogger blogs. Not even my own. Hopefully others aren't experiencing this. But as for AJM's comment, I just want to say, "I vote for" just means that's what I want to happen, not what I think will happen. Even though in this case I did think it wold happen. But just to clarify.]

You can blame me. Between annual summer events and a Paw Sox game, I've somehow missed three Red Sox games in a row, and they've lost them all. I need to be watching/listening to will them to victory. I'll be watching tomorrow night.

Tonight was the annual Bryant Park movie. It was Harold & Maude this time. Maybe I'll post some pics soon. Warning: they'll look the same as they do every year....

I would show you my video of the pitch the Paw Sox closer threw with two outs in the ninth to cap off a combined no-hitter...except that the Indianapolis guy hit it for a single. The next guy homered, so it was a good thing the Men o' Paws scored two in the eighth--they held on for a 3-2 win.

Then we got in the car and heard a guy on the radio talking about the Red Sox as if they had the worst record in the league. As opposed to the best. Which is what they have.

And then I forgot this post that I apparently wrote at 6:40. Now it's 11:00. Whoops. Anyway, I blame the guy behind me at McCoy. He knew nothing about baseball and had a group of kids with him, along with some other counselor types. So we're all doing the no-talky-talky thing, and then after the bottom of the eighth, which must have been their pre-planned skedaddle time, dipshit says, "okay, round 'em up!" The other counselor girl is forced to say, "well, we can't leave, it's a no-hitter." The dude yells out, "no-hitter?" That was a rough moment for me and I'm sure everyone else around them. Too bad they took Lopez out after the first out of the ninth--he was doing fine. Oh well. Almost my second lifetime no-hitter....