Amanda Jones....

It may be the Royals, but a road win is a road win.  For the second night in a row, the Sox spanked the homeboys from Kansas City.  The Red Sox have now improved thier post-Manny record to 5-1.  It remains to be seen if these wins are a by-product of the level of competion they have played, however Kansas City had been hot, winning seven of eight coming into thier series at home versus the Red Sox.

  Tim Wakefield again pitched another quality start, however this time he was awarded some run support, and the win.  Wakefield went six innings, throwing only 81 pitches in the process.  He only allowed four hits, and struck out six, while walking zero Royals.  Wake gave up only one earned, the other was unearned due to a past ball, a side affect of a knuckle ball night.  The bullpen was shakey, but did not bend in thier three innings of work.  Manny Delcarmen, Justin Masterson, and Jonathan Papelbon worked the last three frames.  Delcarmen and Papelbon both struggled but got timely outs to escape thier innings unscathed and unscored upon.  If you are scoring at home, since Okajima's two out homerun in the 8th inning of Friday's game, the Sox bullpen has pitched 15 scoreless innings.

  It was another good pretty good night for the Boston batters as they put an eight spot on the scoreboard.  Of the starters that played the entire game, only Mike Lowell did not have a hit.  Jason Bay, J.D. Drew and Jacoby Ellsbury had multi-hit nights, and Ellsbury blasted a three run homer in the 7th that put the game on ice.  For the second night in a row, Nancy Drew did a good job from the lead-off spot, getting on base three times.  Can't say enough about rookie phenom Jed Lowrie, he continues to play great, and get timely hitting.  Jason Bay also continued to stay white hot, as he had another two hit night, he has now run his average to .423 in his six games in a Sox uniform.

  Off day today, as the Sox head to Chicago for a four game series with the first place White Sox.  The pitching looks about equal, with the exception of the game the Sox will have to run Clay Buchholtz to the mound.  Game two will feature Dice-K versus our old buddy Jose Contreas.