Wakefield falls apart in the 5th, Angels win 10-4

This is Tim Wakefield's worst start in quite some time. The more I see of Wakefield the more I get the impression that he can't pitch to good teams. It seems like everytime he's put up against a team that can produce offensively his knuckleball is getting hit all over the park. Against younger, less experienced teams who haven't seen the knuckleball very much he's unhittable.

Sox Pitching: F
Wakefield: F
Delcarmen: C-
Tavarez: D+
Snyder: C+

Tim Wakefield had one good inning, the third. He went 1-2-3 in that inning, but would look shaky in the first, second and fourth innings and would have to be pulled early in the 5th when his game completely fell apart. Wakefield gave up the lead and handed Manny Delcarmen the baseball with inherited runners and no outs in the inning. Delcarmen didn't do him any favors by allowing both inherited runners to score in his inning of work before finally bringing this inning to a close. Julian Tavarez's one inning of work also looked terrible with coco crisp making an error and another two runs to score. This is about where I decided to go watch something else. From what I can see this is where Tavarez induced a double play to end the inning. Kyle Snyder put up the only respectable pitching performance for the sox by eating two innings. He posted a 1-2-3 inning in the 7th, quickly got two outs in the eighth, allowed a solo homerun and then got himself into and out of trouble to end the inning.

Sox Batting: C
Heroes: Doug Mirabelli (1 for 4 HR, 2 RBI), Kevin Youkilis (2 for 4, 1 RBI), Dustin Pedroia (2 for 4, 2 R)
Goats: David Ortiz (0 for 4), Julio Lugo (0 for 4)

Even if the sox had a better day at the plate I don't think it would have made too much of a difference given that the pitching staff gave up 10 runs. There were some missed opportunities. Sending Mike Lowell home with no outs in the inning seems like a terrible idea in hindsight and probably cost the Red Sox two runs. Mike could have scored on the ground out by JD Drew that followed and coco could advance and then score on the ground out by Doug Mirabelli that followed. Instead, the sox got nothing out of this inning. Although it did yield a run, I felt that the two men on with no outs situation in the first was squandered with both Ortiz and Manny sacrificing. The Red Sox posted 4 1-2-3 innings and that's just not going to win games.

This drops the AL East lead down to just 5 games as the Yankees have won 5 straight and 8 of their last 10. If the Yankees don't cool off soon we might have a race on our hands. Fortunately, the Yankees get Halladay in Toronto tonight and then 3 games in Cleveland. The Red Sox finish the last of their west coast games tonight, head to Baltimore for 3 games and then come back to Fenway for 3 games against the Devil Rays.

Oh....and Barry Bonds hit a homerun and broke a record of some importance...