I'm a former copy editor, forgive me.

The Yankees chose Joba 41st in 2006, the highest pick for any American Indian player in the history of the college draft. Starting the season with the Yankees' single-A affiliate in Tampa, he streaked through their system -- double-A ball in Trenton, N.J.; triple-A in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, Pa. -- in what seems like less time than it takes to drive from Florida to the Bronx.

-The Wall Street Journal

Jacoby Ellsbury, the 23rd overall pick in 2005 and a Navajo, begs to differ.

Yup, Tito does want to be sacked.

Exhibit A: The usage of Eric Gagné tonight, with no Papelbon in sight despite not pitching yesterday.

If this moron is extended, I'll lose all faith in humanity. Luis Alicea for Manger in 2008? I think I could get on board with that.

I'm taking the LSAT September 29, so I'll be gone until then.

Joe Morgan and why he sucks

Caught this gem while flipping between the Pats and Sox tonight:

"Sometimes Boston gets a call here or there and (the Angels) were concerned about it. I don't think the umpires do it intentionally, but that's the way many teams feel. Sometimes things happen in Boston and that just happened. Something just happened."

Wow. Top-notch analysis, Joe. Normally I let the folks over at FJM take care of the Morgan ass-raping, but let's just make sure we all understand what Joe, here, thinks:

Boston gets calls in their favor at home in Fenway Park. Brilliant, Joe. The umpires really helped us win all those World Series titles between 1918 and 2003. Tim Tschida, anyone?

(I know I'm not the only one who still curses that name every now and again.)

I can't decide if I want to go to the Red Sox game(s) this weekend. The last and only time I've been to six games in one season was 2004. Color me superstitious, but I'm sitting on five games right now and I kind of feel like I have to go. If I do it'll probably be Saturday night. I'll try not to almost kill any more relief pitchers in the process.

In other news, the Patriots are really good.

Tito, you wanna give the division away?

I will never understand Terry Francona. Never. Tonight, my dad says, "I've met rocks smarter than Tito." So true.

First, he was WAY too slow with the hook on Dice-K, was obviously completely cooked and at 120 pitches. It took a ridiculous pitching peformance from Timlin to get the last out in that inning, and I still don't think there is a Red Sox fan on earth who feels comfortable with Timlin pitching with runners on, let alone the bases LOADED.

Next, resident LOOGY Javier Lopez comes in to face quite a few lefties. He gets two quick outs, walks Posada, and all of a sudden the sky is fucking falling and we need to bring in Okajima? HUH? The Red Sox were up 7-2 at this point.

Francona's always been hesistant to bring in Okajima again after he pitches in one inning. So I'm thinking, "All right, he'll warm up Gagné or Buchholz or Manny Delcarmen" or basically do ANYTHING except bring Oki back. OH well, out comes Oki for the top of the eighth. His first two batters crush the baseball. 7-4 game. Time to get Oki out with the guys who were warming during the bottom of the seventh, oh wait .... nobody was. So we're stuck with Okajima and he promptly walks Cabrera and gives up a double to Damon. Jima's hanging his shit up in the zone and that doesn't even warrant a mound visit?

WAKE UP, TERRY. Instead of having somebody warming, now he's rushing Papelbon to come in. He obviously wasn't ready to pitch and it showed. You saw what happened.

This is just about the hundredth time this season that Francona has SO poorly managed the bullpen that even the casual fan can see it.

On top of the pitching, WHY THE FUCK is Crisp pinch-running in the eighth? Yes, he's the second-best base stealer on the team. But he's also got a bad hip that kept him out of the starting lineup. I can imagine running on a bad hip is probably not the easiest thing in the world ... caught stealing to end the eighth. Fucking perfect. It also removed Mike Lowell's bat from the game. Not that it mattered in the grand scheme of things, but had that game gone extra innings and Royce fucking Clayton comes up for Lowell, I'm going to start hurling things at my television.

The ninth leaves you with the black hole of the lineup to try to hit Rivera. Drew reached on a gift from Cano ... and that was all the offense we mustered against the once-beatable, now completely dominant Rivera.

Cool, Terry. The lead is still 4.5 but it feels like it's about -2 right now. I see no way this team holds on to the division lead. Come back here in two weeks and tell me I'm wrong, I don't care. But this is not a team that is playing or being managed as a division winner.

Pats' punishment

This is good material for an off-day.

First, Roger Goodell: Go crawl away back to your hole and die. The first-round pick is certainly much higher that I predicted in the previous entry. But you know what? I think I can move on from losing the 32nd pick in the Draft.

That's right, Joey Porters, Carson Palmers, Hines Wards, etcs. of the world. Keep running your fucking mouths. Keep giving us bulletin board material. Keep saying that illegal taping, which Belichik admitted in his released statement was NEVER used during games, contributed to the Super Bowl reign. Because it only fuels this incredibly talented team's fire. They WILL be Super Bowl Champions in February, and they will be losing the very last pick in the first round, which I think we can all move on from.

Also, mark your calendar for December 16, because that's when those cry-baby Jets come to Foxborro. It's going to be an ass-whooping of epic proportions. I hope it is on national television so EVERYONE can see that the New England Patriots do not need spy material to put Mangini in his place.

So Mr. Goodell, at least try to smile when you're handing the Patriots the Lombardi Trophy in February. Bill Belichick may be $500,000 poorer, but he will have the last laugh.

huge series coming up

It's September 13 and we're still only five games up in the division. It seems like we should have clinched this thing forever ago, but with the Yankees winners of seven straight, the magic number hasn't been dwindeling very rapidly.

Still -- two solid wins over Tampa Bay in the last two days. Ortiz gave the Red Sox only their third ninth-inning walk-off this season with a dinger that hit off a chick's shirt in the front row of the right-field stands. FWIW, Delmon Young should have caught the ball, but he took a Gavin Dickey-esque circuitous route and never planted himself in front of the wall to make the catch. Ortiz's two home runs accounted for every run tonight. Sox fans have to feel good that Papi appears to be hitting some kind of stride heading into mid-September. Not that he hasn't hit well all year (.320/.434/.589), but the clutch hits have eluded him.

Last night, Boston went from seven runs down to seven runs up. It was pretty remarkable, although it was against the Tampa Bay bullpen, so ... yeah. Drew was 3-for-4 with a home run. I was listening on the radio, but I think my dad said it was his first home run at Fenway since April. Could we possibly be seeing Drew come out of his season-long power funk? That might be just what the doctor ordered (pardon the horrible cliché) with Wakefield and Matsuzaka seemingly hitting brick walls.

Friday begins the big series with the Yankees at Fenway. We're off tomorrow and the Yankees play Toronto, so assuming they win that game and we're swept over the weekend, the worst we can be is up 1.5 with 12 games remaining. Not that I think we'll be swept or anything, but I'd like to sew up this division as fast as possible to set the rotation for the playoffs and have first dibs on Division Series A (the one with the extra day of rest).

By the way, I know it's no one particular person's fault, but I'm not happy at all with the Patriots-Chargers game perfectly lining up with the Sox-Yankees game on Sunday night. My remote control skills, along with my sanity will be tested. Three hours of Joe Morgan is three hours too much.

Speaking of the Pats, my prediction for their penalty: $500,000 and a fourth-rounder. You gotta factor in Bob Kraft's enormous weight in the NFL and figure Goodell will go relatively easy on them. I'd be shocked if the draft pick we lose is any higher than Round Four.

Buchholz no-hits Orioles

I rarely update this blog anymore, but tonight's monumental feat by rookie Clay Buchholz deserves a post.

Today was a fantastic sports day, period. My beloved Florida Gators opened their season with a lightning-shortened romp over Western Kentucky. My personal story with Buchholz starts with this game, because I was out drinking Friday night, got about three hours of sleep, and woke up to begin tailgating around 8 a.m. Needless to say, after three hours in the hot Florida sun watching what can hardly be called a game, I was dead tired. I took a nap when I got home, and ended up sleeping through Buchholz's first two innings of work. I woke up around 7:45, walked out to the living room and jokingly asked my dad if Clay still had his no-hitter going. He threw a pillow at me and told me not to jinx it.

Seven innings later and Clay had completed the first Red Sox no-hitter since Derek Lowe in 2002, and the first one I have personally watched. For Nomo's and Lowe's, I remember being relegated to internet audio. That was back before we invested in mlb.tv. I remember how crushed I was when John Flaherty broke up Pedro's no-hitter at Tampa Bay (the infamous Gerald Williams brawl game). And of course, I was listening to Schilling's bid for a perfect game this summer on the radio while at work. So this no-hitter was really special for me in that it's the first Red Sox no-no I've seen live.

Really, the kid is unbelievable. It took 115 pitches, and Theo Epstein admitted after the game that if he'd gotten to 120, he would have been removed. His next-longest outing this year was 94 pitches in the minors. He really had the curve and change working, keeping Orioles hitters off-balance and outright baffling them at times. Varitek's pitch calling has been criticized this year, but Tek deserves a lot of credit for Buchholz's peformance. I don't think Clay shook him off one time; the rookie had to rely on Varitek's veteran expertise.

It's been said a lot, but Pedroia's diving stop to rob Miguel Tejada was absolutely the play of the game. As Miggui was hitting, I turned to my dad and said, "You just know that little whining bitch is going to break this up." He tried, but Little Dustin's dive and rocket across the infield sealed the no-hitter in my mind. After he made that play, I knew Clay was going to finish the job. I particularly enjoyed his "FUCK YEAH" scream after he made the play. You could tell how fired up all of the players, both on the field and in the dugout, were to take part in this game.

It's also worth noting that the Red Sox were really reeling coming into tonight's game. They were swept by New York in the Bronx in a series that, had the Red Sox even showed up for, could have effectively eliminated the Yankees in the divisional race. The Sox were throwing their three best starters, and all three took losses ... mostly due to the offense's complete inability to generate runs. They scored six runs in three games after scoring FORTY-SIX in a weekend series at Chicago. Then the O's came in losers of nine straight games and Boston went and dropped Friday's night's contest with them. Wakefield had to be scratched from his start, pushing Tavarez up to pitching Friday. That was what opened the door to Buchholz's start tonight, so I guess we can thank Wakefield for the no-hitter.

It was a pretty special night to be a Sox fan tonight. The only thing that slightly soured the night was having to cheer up a certain Michigan fan who is now on suicide watch for the next few days. We're five games up of New York with 26 games remaining. The divisional title is well in sight.

Once again, congrats to Clay. What a fantastic pitching performance. This kid's future is so incredibly bright, and I'm just ecstatic he's in our organization.