Tuesday, August 16

Jane and Lucy, but what is the car's name?

There are new pictures of Jane and Lucy. I send a great thanks to Mary for sending them along.

I picked up my new (to me anyway) car yesterday. I've decided that it is a girl car, but I haven't settled on a name...I kind of think Betty, but I have the feelingsomeone else has a car named Betty. I haven't taken pictures of it yet, but hope to soon.

As you may or may not know, Chris and I went to Fenway Park on Saturday. We watched a triumphant victory of the clan of the Red Sock over the clan of the White Sock. I am just reminder of the movie Black Arrow which was about red roses and white roses. Odd. Anyway, back to the point at hand. The game was briefly interrupted by a forty minute rain delay. The best part of the experience was seeing Curt Shilling pitch in relief, that was fabulous! Manny Ramirez was also fairly amusing as he spent almost as much time sitting in the Green Monster as playing on the field.

Here is the official story from mlb.com.

BOSTON -- There's no better feeling in the world for a starting pitcher than having a red-hot offense behind you. Such was the case on Saturday night for Tim Wakefield, who shut down the White Sox hitters and let his batters do the rest in a 7-4 win at Fenway Park. Boston's sixth straight win allowed them to stay five games ahead of the second-place Yankees in the American League East.

Wakefield (12-9) captured sole possession of the team lead in wins by holding Chicago to seven hits and two runs over 6 2/3 innings. The victory ran his personal winning streak to four and the club's home winning tear to 13 straight, now 11 shy of the MLB mark set by the 1988 Red Sox.

The game was halted in the bottom of the sixth due to thunderstorms, lightning and heavy rains. The delay lasted just over 40 minutes.

Wakefield's only trouble came when he took the mound following the delay. He allowed back-to-back homers to Paul Konerko and Aaron Rowand to open the seventh before being relieved by Jeremi Gonzalez following a two-out double by Joe Crede.

For six innings, Wakefield, who with the victory matched his win total of a year ago, allowed just four hits and kept the White Sox off the board.

"I had it going on for the first six innings, and my rhythm and timing got off after the rain delay," he said. "I tried to stay loose and stay focused mentally within the rain delay. I made two bad pitches to Konerko and Rowand."

"He was so good, and then he went back out and didn't look tired to me or anything," Red Sox manager Terry Francona added. "He didn't look stiff, but a couple of balls rolled and they hit home runs."

The knuckleballer outdueled the Chicago right-hander, who entered the contest leading the AL in wins. But Jon Garland (16-6) couldn't collect his 17th victory on this night, as the Red Sox tagged him for nine hits and five runs over 5 1/3 innings. With a heat index of 98 at first pitch, Garland threw 75 pitches in three innings and reached the 90-pitch mark by the end of four.

"When you get good defense and great offense and you can hold a team like the White Sox down like that, it's going to give you some chances to win," said Wakefield.

Leading the offensive charge was Roberto Petagine, who belted his first Major League homer in nearly seven years and drove in a pair with two hits. His homer deep to the right-field grandstand seats opening the second against Garland gave Boston a 1-0 lead and marked his first homer in the Majors since his roundtripper for Cincinnati on September 27, 1998.

"After six years of playing in Japan, it's been a long time for me to hit on in the Major Leagues again," said the 34-year-old native of Caracas, Venezuela, who has driven in eight runs in his last four games. "I'm very happy to get it but, actually, we won, and that's more important to me."

Tony Graffanino doubled twice and joined Friday night's hero, David Ortiz, in collecting three hits. Both have had key roles in helping the Red Sox beat Kenny Rogers, Mark Buehrle and Garland in succession.

"I think we've been taking a good approach, making them throw a lot of pitches," Graffanino said. "When they make a mistake, we've been taking advantage of it and hitting the ball hard. Tonight, Garland had a lot of pitches early in that ballgame, and in that kind of heat and humidity, it looked like it wore him down a little bit and we took advantage."

The Red Sox strung together four straight hits to open the third against Garland to extend their lead to 3-0. Then, with one out, Doug Mirabelli was hit by a pitch, loading the bases for Bill Mueller. The Sox third baseman lifted a sacrifice fly to center, scoring Manny Ramirez with the third run of the inning and giving Boston a four-run cushion.

Mike Remlinger relieved Gonzalez with two outs in the eighth, but allowed a walk and a double. The lefty reliever has faced six batters in two outings and has failed to record an out.

Curt Schilling came on with two outs in the eighth in relief of the struggling Remlinger and recorded the game's final four outs.

Chicago's Jermaine Dye led off the ninth with a home run, but Schilling buckled down to close the door on the White Sox.

Mike Petraglia is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


Later Days!

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