After spending the past two and a half weeks on the DL with stiffness in his lower back and tendinitis in his pitching shoulder, Tim Wakefield, the Red Sox 42-year old pitcher, looked like he hadn’t missed a beat Tuesday night hurling five innings and allowing only three runs on eight hits which was good enough to lead Boston past New York 7-3 in front of a Yankee Stadium crowd of over 55,000 fans.

Besides a pair of Johnny Damon solo homeruns, his 10th and 11th of the season, Wakefield shut down the potent Yankees lineup with knuckleball after knuckleball. He was able to keep himself out of trouble most of the night by working ahead in the count and not allowing leadoff men to reach base. The Boston bullpen was able to preserve Wake’s 8th win of the season by pitching four shutout innings in which they allowed only two hits.

“Phenomenal job,” Wakefield said of his teammates who were able to finish the game off.

The Yankees jumped in front when Johnny Damon led off the bottom of the first inning with his 10th homerun of the year off of Wakefield but the Sox quickly answered scoring a run in the top of the second inning on an RBI single by Jacoby Ellsbury, tying the score at 1-1. Jose Molina connected on a two out single in the bottom of the second inning to drive in Hideki Matsui, putting the Yankees back ahead 2-1, but again, the Sox would come right back with the answer scoring twice in the top of the third with three consecutive hits off of Yankees starting pitcher Andy Pettitte. DH David Ortiz led off the inning with a double and scored when Kevin Youkilis drove him home in the next at bat with a double of his home. Jason Bay got into the hitting action connecting on an RBI single to plate Youkilis to put Boston ahead for good 3-2.

The Red Sox chased Pettitte from the game in the fifth inning when they were able to score three more runs on four hits. Coco Crisp knocked an RBI single to right-center field to put Boston a head 4-2 and then the big blow came when Bay drove home two more runs on his second hit of the night to put Boston on top 6-2. Bay would later add another RBI on a sacrifice fly in the sixth inning to round out the Red Sox scoring.

New York did have some chances in the later innings to get back into this one, and they had the right guys up at the plate but just could not get the clutch hit they needed. Reigning AL MVP Alex Rodriguez went 0-5 on the night including grounding into two double plays, once with the bases loaded, and striking out twice, once to end the game. He was loudly booed by the Yankee Stadium crowd as the loss dropped New York 6 games behind the Sox for the Wild Card race and 9.5 games behind Tampa Bay for the division race.

“Tonight, you can put it on me,” Rodriguez said. “It was a lousy night. We pretty much screwed it up every way you can screw it up. There’s absolutely no excuse.”

Sox relief pitcher Justin Masterson was summoned to face Rodriguez with the bases loaded and only one out in the seventh inning. Masterson who is known as a groundball pitcher was able to force A-Rod to ground into an inning ending 4-6-3 double play.

When manager Terry Francona was asked about whether or not he thought twice about making the move to the rookie he said, “Poise is not a problem for him. He gives us options. We feel comfortable using him late in the game and he deserves it.”

After the big out last night, A-Rod is now 1-10 on the season with the bases loaded and 0-7 with the bases loaded when there were less then two outs in the inning. He’s now grounded into nine double plays over the last 19 games.

“I want him in that situation,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. “I’ve seen him change a game with one swing.”

Rodriguez and the Yankees will get a chance to even the series tonight when they face RHP Paul Byrd. Byrd is 1-1 since being traded to Boston from the Cleveland Indians and is probably thrilled to face another team besides the Toronto Blue Jays, whom he has faced in his last three starts going 2-1 with a 3.29 ERA. Since the All-Star break, Byrd is 5-1 and sporting a 2.55 ERA over that span. Byrd is excited to pitch against the Yankees with his new team, especially with All-Star catcher Jason Varitek calling his pitches.

“I knew he was a good catcher, but he’s a great receiver,” Byrd said. “He’s really good. He blocks the ball better than I thought he did. What he brings behind the plate, a wealth of knowledge against the hitters is great. I’ve enjoyed throwing to him. I think we’ve jelled pretty quickly.”

The Yankees will counter with RHP Sidney Ponson who is 7-4 on the year with a 4.67 ERA. He’s lost his last two decisions and is coming off his shortest outing of the season when he lasted only 2+ innings against Toronto allowing eight hits and seven earned runs in the Blue Jays 14-3 win over New York last Thursday.

Tonight’s first pitch is at 7:05pm EST.

The rivalry between the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees will live on after the 2008 season, however, Yankee Stadium will not. Over the next month, the ‘House that Ruth Built’ will be seeing its final stretch of games before the doors close for good, highlighted by the three game series with the Red Sox which begins tonight. Over the history of the ballpark, the Red Sox and Yankees have met 770 times in New York during the regular season with the Yankees owning an impressive 483-283 advantage with four ties mixed in over the years.

“Because of the media and the fans, there’s more energy or electricity in the ballpark, but you can’t bring in a pitcher an inning earlier. They don’t give you two wins when you beat the Yankees, so you can’t do it differently,” Red Sox manager Terry Francona said ahead of the three-game series.

Heading into tonight’s matchup, the Sox hold a five game lead over the Yankees in the wild-card race but with a total of six remaining meetings between the two teams, it is far too early to count the Bronx Bombers out of the race. Last year, it appeared the Yankees streak of 12 consecutive seasons of qualifying for the playoffs was in jeopardy but they played amazing baseball over the final six weeks to squeak in with the wild card berth. If the Yanks can not win this series against Boston, their streak of 13 consecutive playoff bids will certainly be at risk once again.

“If we put on a run here, there’s no question we can make it,” Hank Steinbrenner, a Yankees’ co-chairman, said Monday night at the team’s spring training complex in Tampa, Fla. “There’s no question with the number of games we have left, it’s possible.”

One Sox player who is really excited about the series is newcomer Jason Bay. The recently acquired left-fielder has never experienced a rivalry with such magnitude as he’s about to, but he’s ready for it.

“I’m looking forward to it. That’s what you play baseball for is that type of atmosphere, those type of games,” said Bay, acquired by Boston from Pittsburgh last month in the Manny Ramirez trade.

Tonight, the Yankees will send veteran southpaw Andy Pettitte (13-9, 4.17 ERA) to the mound to face the Sox veteran knuckleballer Tim Wakefield (7-8, 3.67 ERA). The start will be Wakefield’s first since returning from the DL with stiffness in his lower back and right shoulder tenderness, causing him to miss two weeks of action.

Tomorrow’s matchup features two pitchers who have also been around the league for quite some time. The Yankees will let Sidney Ponson (7-4, 4.67 ERA) take the ball while Boston will hand it to Paul Byrd (8-11, 4.61 ERA). Ponson’s career began in 1998 while Byrd first pitched in the big leagues in 1995. The two have both logged over 1600 career innings pitched.

In the series finale, Mike Mussina (16-7, 3.45 ERA), will toss against Jon Lester (12-5, 3.49 ERA) in the last regular season game at Yankee Stadium between the two storied franchises. Lester is 2-0 in his young career against New York while Mussina boasts a lifetime record of 20-17 against Boston in 55 starts.

The series could make or break the last month for the Yankees but as far as the history of the stadium goes, Terry Francona just wants to focus on these three games and try to ignore the hype about everything else.

“I guess I felt more of that during the All-Star game because it was an All-Star game and you had time to maybe think about things,” he said. “When we’re playing the team, we’re just trying to beat them. That’s really what I care about. I don’t get too caught up in the other stuff.”

Tonight’s first pitch is at 7:05pm EST.

Tom Brady has yet to play in a pre-season game for the New England Patriots this year. The result says it all. At 0-3 in the pre-season the Patriots don’t want to miss Brady for one down of regular season play. That might be why Patriots coach Bill Belichick has kept Brady out of the action so far, even though Brady says he’s ready to play. Brady has been recovering from an undisclosed injury to his right foot but has been practicing with the team. 

The Patriots have one more pre-season game before their home opener on 9/7 against the Kansas City Chiefs. They’ll play the Giants in a Super Bowl rematch on 8/28. It’s possible that Brady could see some snaps in this game. We’ll have to wait and see.

Patriots tickets are available for all 2008 games.

In a game that featured four lead changes and two tied scores, it was the Boston Red Sox who eventually came out on top over the Toronto Blues Jays 6-5 in 11 innings thanks to the help of rookie Jed Lowrie’s solo homerun which proved to be the difference in Sunday afternoons game at the Rogers Center in Toronto, Canada. Lowrie’s second career big league homer came with one out in the 11th off of Toronto reliever Brandon League (0-2), who had not allowed a run in his previous 12 appearances. The win propels the Sox into a three game series with the New York Yankees in New York, possibly their last three game series ever at Yankee Stadium.

“Any series we have with New York is going to be a big series, but when we come off of a win like this, I feel like everyone will show up and just have a little more energy and be able to feed off this game,” Lowrie said.

Sox starting pitcher Dice-K Matsuzaka allowed five earned runs on eight hits through six innings of work while striking out eight in the outing. He did not factor into the decision, nor did Toronto starter A.J. Burnett who’s numbers were similar to Matsuzaka’s, going seven innings and allowing five earned runs on seven hits while striking out seven.  The Blue Jays struck first, scoring twice in the bottom of the first inning on a Vernon Wells two run homer, his 13th on the year. Boston would take advantage of back to back walks by Burnett in the fourth inning when Dustin Pedroia belted a three-run bomb, his 14th of the season, to put Boston ahead 3-2. David Ortiz followed it up with a double and Kevin Youkilis drove him in with an RBI single to give Boston the 4-2 lead.

Lyle Overbay took Matsuzaka deep in the fourth inning, a solo shot and his 11th on the year to cut the Boston lead to 4-3. It was the first time that Matsuzaka allowed multiple homeruns in a game on the road all season.  The Jays would put two more runs on the board in the sixth inning to take a 5-4 lead but the Sox were able to gun Matt Stairs out at the plate to keep the deficit at one run which proved to be a big play in the games end result. Rob Barajas belted the go ahead RBI double to left scoring Alex Rios but a good throw by Jason Bay to Lowrie at third, followed by a perfect relay to Jason Varitek resulted in Stairs being tagged out at home to end the inning.  Coco Crisp would then lead off the top of the seventh by belting his seventh homer of the season over the left-center field fence to pull the score even once again at 5-5. After that, the Boston bullpen was able to hold the Jays offense at bay, pitching a total of five scoreless innings, allowing only one hit. Justin Masterson worked 1 1/3 innings, Hideki Okajima worked 2/3 innings, Jonathan Papelbon pitched a scoreless 9th and 10th innings to pick up the win and Manny Delcarmen closed it out pitching the 11th to earn only his second career save.

Left fielder Jason Bay, who made a leaping catch at the wall in extra innings, called it a “huge win” for Boston, which leads the AL wild-card race. “A few of us were talking that it’s probably a lot bigger than just a regular win, given the way (the Blue Jays) are playing and that they’re trying to catch up to us,” Bay said.

Boston sits atop the race for the AL Wildcard by 1 game over the Minnesota Twins who lost yesterday to the LA Angels 5-3. Next in the race are the New York Yankees who trail Boston by 5 games in the standings heading into this weeks three game series in the Bronx. The starting pitching match ups for the three games will be Tim Wakefield vs. Andy Pettitte on Tuesday night. The start will be the first for Wakefield since coming off the DL with stiffness in his lower back. Wednesday night Paul Byrd will hurl against Sidney Ponson followed by a Thursday afternoon match up of Jon Lester vs. Mike Mussina.

Following the three games in New York, Boston will return to Fenway Park for a six game homestand featuring a three game series against the Chicago White Sox who are battling the Twins in the AL Central for the division lead, and the runner up battling the Sox for the Wild Card. Baltimore will come into town after Chicago for the first three games on the schedule for September. The Sox will break the all time consecutive sell out streak at Fenway during this series on Sept. 3rd. Tickets are still available for this historic event!

Over the final month of the season, Boston will play 17 of their final 26 games at home where they have the 2nd best home record in the American League. Tickets are still available for all remaining home games!

Not many people thought they would see Carl Pavano back on the mound for the Yankees, but this past Saturday the “American Idle” made his first start since April of 2007. The result was actually rather good. Pavano pitched five innings, giving up three runs on seven hits with five strike-outs. It was only Pavano’s 20th start since signing a large multi-year deal with the Yankees in 2005.

The Yankees got Pavano his first win since 2007 with help from Jason Giambi’s 25th homer and 3 RBI. Hideki Matsui also contributed with a solo shot of his own.  The Yankees will need more of the same from Pavano if they still want a shot at post-season play. Without Chien-Ming Wang and Joba Chamberlain the Yankees are thin on starting pitching.  The Yankees currently trail the Red Sox by 5 games in the AL Wild Card race.

The Yankees will open up a three game set against the Red Sox this Tuesday. Yankees tickets are still available for the game.

Three weeks into the 2008 NFL Pre-Season, the defending AFC Champion New England Patriots find themselves with a 0-3 record after falling to the Philadelphia Eagles 27-17 Friday night at Gillette Stadium. In a game that appeared closer then it was, the Patriots were never able to get it going offensively while they also struggled with their special teams defensive unit, allowing two returns for touchdowns in under a two minute span to end the first half.

The Eagles jumped out first scoring a field goal in their first possession, a David Ackers kick from 24-yards, put them ahead 3-0 with 8:17 remaining in the first quarter of play. The Patriots were only able to pick up one first down in the first quarter which came on a 22-yard scramble by back up QB Matt Cassel. Besides this run, Cassel had an awful night, again failing to lead his team to a TD scoring drive for the third straight game.

Cassel did “some good things, some could have been done better,” Head Coach Bill Belichick said. “Protection at times was a problem.”

On the other side of the field, veteran QB Donovan McNabb looked sharp completing 13 of 17 passes for 180 yards and a touchdown, all coming in the first half.

“My confidence comes from how the team feels and I think the team is really on a high right now,” McNabb said.

The Eagles ended the half with a bang by scoring two touch downs on kick returns, one of a 101 kickoff return by Quintin Demps and the other on a 76 yard punt return by DeSean Jackson to pull away 24-3.

In the second half, the Patriots looked a little better on the offensive end behind the lead of third string QB Matt Gutierrez. He completed 14 of 20 passes and threw two touchdown passes to make the score a respectable 27-17, but this was all against the Eagles second team defensive unit.

“Matt did a good job of leading the team,” Belichick said of Gutierrez. “He hung in there well.”

With the loss, Patriots fans are growing a little nervous because they have yet to see their superstar QB, Tom Brady, in action during any of the pre-season. The reigning NFL MVP has been nursing a foot injury and has only recently begun to practice again with the team. He insists he will be ready to go for the Week 1 of the NFL regular season when the Patriots play the Kansas City Chiefs at home.

“I’ve only been here two games and things haven’t been good,” said Patriots safety John Lynch, who signed after being released by Denver. “I don’t think you put too much stock on results, but we’ve still got to regroup.”

The Patriots will have one more opportunity to try and figure things out before the regular season kicks off in two weeks this coming Thursday when they face the defending Super Bowl Champion New York Giants in a rematch of last years Super Bowl at Giant Stadium.

Whenever an NFL team goes an entire pre-season without posting a win, it’s natural for their fans to panic but in reality, the games do not count and the real purpose of these games is to find what lineups work well together on the field. There’s no need to bail on the 2008-2009 Patriots team just yet, they’ve got a lot of football ahead of them and line backer Heath Evans put it best when he said, “I know one thing, we’re a Bill Belichick-coached football team and we’re going to find a way to get better.”

The defending champion Boston Celtics announced the signing of Darius Miles to a non-guaranteed contract today. Miles hasn’t played since the 2005-2006 season with the Portland Trailblazers. Miles sustained what some called a career ending injury to his knee and had been unavailable for the past two seasons. Apparently now healthy after surgery to his knee, Miles will attempt to make the Celtics roster this Fall.

“He’s coming to training camp and he’s going to try to prove that he can make the team,” said Celtics general manager Danny Ainge. “He has come in for a couple of workouts. He’ll try to make the team somehow.”

For his part, Darius is just excited to prove he can contribute to the Celtics.

Boston Celtics tickets are now available.

Two weeks ago, the New York Mets sat a few games over .500 knowing that if they wanted to make the 2008 postseason, they’d have to start playing better baseball. With last nights 5-4 victory over the Atlanta Braves, the Mets now find themselves 14 games over .500 at (71-57), atop the NL East by 2.5 games and 9-1 over their past 10 games. If that’s not better baseball, I don’t know what is.

Carlos Delgado exploded for five hits and three RBI’s to lift the Mets to their ninth win in 10 games. The five hit performance ties a career high that he had previously accomplished back in 1998 with the Toronto Blue Jays. With the score tied at 4-4, his fifth and final hit came in the bottom of the ninth inning, finding an outfield hole allowing David Wright to score the winning run from second.

“I’m seeing the ball well,” Delgado said. “It was a big win for us. We’re really confident. We’ve been able to find a way to win ballgames. That is something we weren’t doing early in the year.”

Since July 1st, Delgado is batting .321 with 12 homeruns and has driven in 49 runs over the past 48 games. The win also completed a three game sweep of Atlanta, the Mets first three-game sweep at home against the Braves since Sept. 1-3, 2003.

Pedro Martinez gave the Mets seven quality innings allowing four runs on eight hits while striking out two. His first pitch of the game was sent by Yunel Escobar deep into the left field stands for his seventh homerun of the season but Martinez settled down into a groove retiring 15 of the following 16 batters he faced including 1,2,3 innings in the third, fourth and fifth. He got into a little trouble in the sixth, allowing three runs on three hits but he retired the side in the seventh before being lifted in the eighth.

“We continue to put ourselves in position day in and day out to win games,” Mets manager Jerry Manuel said. “We have a good team. We have good chemistry. A lot of things are really working in our favor right now.”

For Atlanta, Mike Hampton made his first appearance against the Met s since July 17, 2005. The southpaw had missed the two previous seasons with elbow surgeries and only made his 2008 debut about a little over a month ago. Hampton pitched well but did not factor into the decision going six innings and allowing three runs on eight hits. He is currently 2-1 with a 6.47 ERA.

“It was fun being out there,” said Hampton who was the MVP of the 2000 NLCS for the Mets. “I might have an opportunity to be out there one more time in September before this place goes but it’ll definitely hold a special place in my memories in my baseball career.”

The loss drops the Braves to a season worst 16 games below .500 at (56-72) and 15 games behind the Mets for the division lead. Since the All-Star break, Atlanta is only 11-22, have lost five in a row and nine of their last 10 games.

The Mets will now welcome the Houston Astros to Shea for a four game series. Tonight’s game features an incredible pitching matchup between Johan Santana (11-7, 2.75 ERA) and Roy Oswalt (11-8, 4.28 ERA). Although neither has a stellar record, both pitchers have absolute filthy stuff and are capable of shutting down any lineup in baseball on any given night.

It has been a rough year for Boston Red Sox rookie Clay Buchholz and things didn’t get any easier Wednesday night in Baltimore against the Orioles. In the shortest outing of his young career, the 24-year old right hander allowed five runs on three hits and three walks while suffering his seventh consecutive loss on the season to fall to a 2-9 record overall. After the 11-6 defeat, the Red Sox had no other choice but to demote Buchholtz to their Double-A affiliate, the Portland Seadogs, for the time being hoping he can get his head and arm back where they need to be.

“People have tough games. I’ve had a tough season,” said Buchholz, who spent two months in Triple-A from mid-May to July 11. “Down there is where you develop. Up here it’s a pennant race. … If you ask if the decision was right, I’d say it was.”

It’s a move that probably could have been made a week ago but with Tim Wakefield on the DL for at least another few days, the Sox tried to get one more start out of Buchholz hoping that he would be able to turn things around and get back on track, especially against the same team who less then a year ago he tossed a no-hitter against at Fenway Park.

“Tough situation. We’re in a pennant race and we’re in Boston and a lot of focus is on him and he feels the responsibility,” Red Sox manager Terry Francona said. “I think coming into this game we were all excited about watching him pitch, but the way it unraveled makes it kind of obvious we had to do something.”

The Sox jumped out to an early 4-0 lead scoring two runs in the first and second innings to give Buchholz some early support. Buchholz retired the side in order in the bottom of the first but got into trouble in the second by allowing three runs on three hits and two walks. It didn’t get any easier in the third when he allowed two of the first three batters to reach on another walk and hit. Francona had seen enough and yanked Buchholtz in favor for relief pitcher David Aardsma. Aardsma was welcomed to the game with Ramon Hernandez blasting his 13th homerun of the season to put the Orioles on top for good 6-4.

“Against Boston you’ve got to be able to hit with men on base,” Orioles manager Dave Trembley said. “You’ve got to score when you get opportunities to score because you never know if you’re going to have enough runs.”

Baltimore was able to put up plenty of runs in this one, not only getting to Buchholz early but to the Sox bullpen as well during the middle innings. The Sox pen allowed six earned runs in only 2 2/3 innings of work from when Buchholz departed through the fifth inning.

Offensively, the Sox were able to generate 13 hits, four more then the Orioles collected but were only able to score six runs on the night. They stranded a total of 9 runners on base, a number totally unacceptable against a mediocre pitching staff like Baltimore’s. Luckily, the Sox lose no ground in the AL East because the division leading Tampa Bay Rays also lost yesterday to the Los Angeles Angels 5-4.

For Baltimore, rookie southpaw Chris Waters picked up his second career victory and improves to 2-0 on the season. After allowing the two first inning runs but escaping from a bases load jam, he calmed down and was able to work his way through five innings allowing five runs, four earned, and letting his offense provide all the support he would need.

“It was tough early but he kept us in the game, hung on right there and he gave us a chance to come back,” said Hernandez, Waters’ batterymate. “He kind of figured it out a little bit. He went through a rough start but he ended up pretty good.”

The Sox have today off as they head across the border to Toronto for a three game weekend series starting tomorrow night. The weekend pitching matchups will look like this: Friday night at 7:07pm Paul Byrd (7-11, 4.55 ERA) vs. Shaun Marcum (8-5, 3.36 ERA), Saturday afternoon at 1:07pm Jon Lester (12-4, 3.17 ERA) vs. Jesse Litsch (8-7, 4.20 ERA), and Sunday afternoon at 1:07pm Dice-K Matsuzaka (15-2, 2.77 ERA) vs. A.J. Burnett (16-9, 4.51 ERA).

Following the three games in Canada, the Sox will head to New York to play what could be their final series at Yankee Stadium.

No, U2 has not set any 2008 or 2009 tour dates yet. But that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy some live music from Bono and the gang. U2 is set to re-release their 1st recorded concert movie, “Live at Red Rocks: Under a Blood Red Sky” in September of 2008. This U2 concert was previously available on VHS but will get its first DVD treatment on this release. U2 will also be re-releasing the album “Under a Blood Red Sky”.

The U2 Red Rocks show was recorded on June 5th, 1983. Look for the album and DVD re-release on September 29, 2008. Also expect some news soon on the new U2 studio album and possible U2 tour for 2008-2009.