G39: Red Sox 7, Athletics 5

The Oakland A's were like Henny Youngman last night: "Take this game -- please." The Red Sox seemed skeptical for awhile, before finally accepting the gift. Which was the polite thing to do.

Boston scored seven runs on only four hits. They drew 11 walks, including a career-high seven from Barry Zito in five innings. The only inning in which they did not get a walk was the seventh. Oakland also committed three errors, two of them coming in the eighth inning:

Cruz pitching; A's up 5-3.
Varitek hit by pitch.
Mueller walked.
Payton walked.
Rincon in to pitch.
Bellhorn struck out.
Damon safe on Hatteberg error at first, run scores.
Street in to pitch.
Renteria singled to right, Byrnes makes two-base error, three runs score.
Ortiz struck out.
Ramirez struck out.

Matt Clement was alright, although he faltered in the fifth and sixth inning. Jay Payton threw a runner out at the plate to end the fifth and Clement left with two on in the sixth. Matt Mantei allowed both of those inherited runners to score.

On the plus side, Alan Embree retired the five batters he faced and Keith Foulke look great in the ninth. He threw all fastballs to strike out Byrnes and after getting ahead of Chavez with fastballs, got him swinging and missing at a 71 mph changeup to end the game.

If I'm going to stay up until 1:33 am, it's good to see a win. Jere has a suggestion: "Why can't these west coast teams play their games at 4:00 PM local time? Don't they know we need our rest? How's this for a compromise--when the Red Sox are gonna lose, start the game two hours earlier? Please?" ... There are only two more late-night west coast games this season: August 18 and 19 in Anaheim.

The Yankees won their 10th in a row as Carl Pavano threw 133 pitches in a complete game shutout. Apparently, Torre doesn't trust his bullpen with a 6-0 lead.

Wells / Etherton at 3:30.