MayDay Summer

Despite a three or four-batter stretch when he couldn’t seem to get the ball over the plate, Derek Lowe pitched a nice game Friday night. While overall I favor the Sox apparent plan to let all their free agents play for their next contracts, I’m starting to think it might be wise to make an exception of Lowe, and to bypass his agent and offer him a mid-range, three-year deal which he'll almost certainly accept. Comparing his performance in the second half of 2003 with his performance this year, I think contract pressure may bother him more than game pressure (and that he might admit as much himself). Sign him now, get the contract off his mind, and let him be all the pitcher he can be, which essentially amounts to a 3.50-ERA, 16-18-win guy with a rubbery-enough arm to do spot relief duty in the post-season. It’s a valuable combination of skills when you think about it, and one not many other pitchers offer.

In the late innings of a close game, is there a batter pitchers want to see less than David Ortiz?

At the risk of ruffling the Cult of Mirabelli, do you think it was such a great idea to call for fastballs from Wakefield whenever he couldn’t get his knuckler over? (I guess Juan Encarcion thought it was a good idea - his homer off a 70-mph Wakefield heater is the longest he'll ever hit in his career.) Why didn't he let Wake walk guys until he found his groove again? At least the loss provided us with two scraps of potentially useful knowledge: 1) The Dodgers, whom we might see in the playoffs, have two set-up men and a closer who can throw in the mid-to-high 90s (the last team with three such pitchers in its bullpen was the 2002 Angels); and 2) there is nothing Dave McCarty can’t do.

Besides making us all feel better about Pedro, Sunday’s win should also make it clear that this team is much better off with the Nomar and Pokey up the middle than it is with Mark Bellhorn’s OBP – unless that OBP comes from Bellhorn playing first. (Remember when second baseman could field their position? The last Boston second baseman who could do it was Luis Alicea, and Reese makes him look like Pete Incaviglia.) Once Nixon returns - they’re saying it might be as soon as Wednesday – this team really, really needs to try a few games in a row with Reese at second, Bellhorn at first, Ortiz at DH and Millar on the bench. And I don’t care how happy Millar makes Manny, if Epstein isn’t actively shopping Millar around for a #3 or #4 starter, in anticipation of Mueller's return, than he’s not doing his job.

Over the weekend the Yankees, with whom Boston dutifully kept pace, notched their twenty-seventh come-from-behind victory of the season, against no one less than Trevor Hoffman. Teams with a knack for coming from behind make tough post-season adversaries (the 1975-6 Reds elevated this to something of an art form).

One last note: Watching Roger Clemens finally lose last night (what’s Todd Walker hitting against Clemens, about .750?), I couldn’t help but feel I was also watching the Astros begin their gradual recession from the playoff race (it annoys me that we can no longer call this a pennant race). The Astro hitters looked one hundred percent helpless against Prior, whose stuff seemed straight from hell. Makes you wonder, too, when Jimy Williams will lose what is almost certainly his last job in baseball. Talk about the end of an era.