Hideo Nomo: Definitely not his best performance of the season (then again, not his worst either). For the five innings he was out there Nomo seemed on the verge of getting into a groove, but it just didn't happen. By the fifth he had thrown 100 pitches, given up 7 hits and allowed 4 free passes. This was definitely a night that the starter needed to be picked up by the offense, and they (the O) came thru huge.

Bombs Away: The Sox bats sang to the tune of four 2-Run homers to lead the attack and basically bury the Ms. Manny hit one in the first, Hillenbrand and Offy one each in the fourth, and Stynes finished off the gopher ball attack with one of his own in the fifth. This is the second time this season the Sox have homered four times in a game.

Jose Offerman: Speaking of the long ball, what is up with Jose? That's three straight games with a dinger. I didn't see the one on Saturday but the one on Sunday and last night were shots (gone without question). For the road trip (3SEA & 3OAK) and last nights game Offy is 9-23 (.391) with 7 RBIs, looks like he's heating up again.

Carl Everett: Sometimes the O is going to have to come from different sources (like Offy above) because Carl has been really slumping lately. For the same time frame as Offy, Carl is 5-29 (.172) and 0 RBIs. Every player slumps and Carl will heat up again, but it's guys like Offerman, O'Leary, Stynes, and Tek who need to step in and produce when this happens.

Troy O'Leary: Maybe his luck is starting to change. After being a big part of Pedro's win on Sunday, Troy collected three more hits yesterday. I mention luck because two of his three hits (the 2B and 3B) could have been caught by CFer Mike Cameron. It seemed like he misjudged his leap on both occasions, allowing the ball to hit the Monster. Sometimes in this game it's better to be lucky than good.

Dante Bichette: It could only be me, but why does it seem like Bichette collects most of his hits when the game is already decided. He had a shot with the bases loaded and then with two men on early in the game, only to fail on both occasions (with two outs). Then when we were up by 9 in the 8th he finally came up with the two-out RBI. Hmmm...

Relief Pitching: I probably should mention the guys who finished off Nomo's win (Wakefield and Lowe). Both threw two very solid innings each. The announcers mentioned it as well, but for the type of pitcher who is supposed to be bad in colder weather, Wakefield has been awesome. As for Lowe, he was touched up for one run, but it was unearned, caused by the first error committed by a Red Sox short stop this season (Lansing).

Mike Lansing: Just one of those night's you want to forget about for him. The only Sox starter to not join the hit parade and commits the first SS error of the season. But for the most part Lansing has done a very nice job over a short filling in for Nomar.

Evil Empire Watch: Twins 2   Y-----s 0
Toronto Watch: Athletics 8   Blue Jays 5

That's all I have for today. Let me know what you think of this format (constructive criticism please) either on the message board or via email.

Castillo goes tonight trying for 4 in a row.

paul@redsox2000.com