1. Two days, two identical wins: The Boston Red Sox have won two games in a row in eerily similar fashions. Both yesterday’s and Tuesday’s game resulted in 1-0 wins over the Kansas City Royals. Jonathan Papelbon came on to save both games, and a Sox starter went 8 strong in each. The only difference was that the Royals collected four times the amount of hits in last night’s game than the previous one. Of course, that’s still just 4 hits. Josh Beckett won his 12th game of the year to move him into a tie with Roy Halladay for most in the majors. Despite his excellent record Beckett has somewhat struggled this year with a 4.78 ERA. He is consistently inconsistent; the type of player who will follow up 5 straight quality starts with 7 earned runs. For the signing of Beckett to pay off, he’ll have to pitch like he did last night more often.
2. 325-game winner, meet 342-game winner: It was a pitching matchup for the ages when Roger Clemens met Greg Maddux yesterday. And I mean this literally. They are a combined 83 years old. Anyway, they are two of the greatest pitchers of all time, and they are the two active leaders on the career wins list. Clemens got the better of this historic duel, winning his 343rd career game with 6 shutout innings. Maddux, who only has two wins since April, took the loss with 3 earned runs in 7 innings. Craig Biggio homered for the visiting Astros, who are still three games under .500. The Cubs would love to trade places, however, as they are 16.5 games back of the division-leading Cardinals and are in serious danger of being passed by the lowly Pirates.
3. Stop streaking, Part I: The pathetic Indians, who are 10 games under .500 despite having outscored their opponents by 34 runs on the year, had apparently had enough of two Angels streaks. They stopped John Lackey’s scoreless streak at 30.2 innings, and they also managed to stop the Angels’ win streak at 8. Lackey allowed a run for the first time in 4 starts. He had lowered his ERA to 2.69 (good for second in the AL), but allowed 5 runs to the Indians. Ben Broussard and Aaron Boone (remember him?) homered for Cleveland, who snapped a 5-game losing streak of their own. In the chaotic AL West, the Angels’ loss moved them from almost in first to third place. They are still only 1.5 back.
4. Stop streaking, Part II: The Braves were going for an all-time record, 6 games in a row with a double-digit run total. The record was 76 years old and held by a classic Yankee team, and the underachieving-until-now Braves offense was looking to break it. But the Cardinals’ best pitcher, Chris Carpenter, managed to cool off the Braves as St. Louis won 8-3. Carpenter pitched 7 innings to earn his ninth win of the season, as first-time Braves starter Jason Shiell took the loss. But the Cardinals couldn’t stop every Brave. Brian McCann homered for the 5th straight game, and red-hot Andruw Jones and Adam LaRoche both drove in runs. The Cardinals are 3.5 games ahead of the Reds in their division, while the Braves are 5 games back of the Reds for the Wild Card.
5. Bonds’ trainer to be set free: The personal trainer who was sent to jail earlier this month for refusing to testify for a grand jury is expected to be released today. Greg Anderson is the key to the perjury charges against Bonds so his lack of cooperation could mean that Bonds will only be indicted on tax evasion charges.
