Jinxed

Last night, before we watched Ryan Madson blow a 3-2 lead in the 9th - the beginning of a bullpen implosion that ended up an 8-3 loss to the Blue Jays in 10 innings - I asked Christine whether she would blame Scott Lauber or Paul Hagen for writing about Madson's improvement, or me for blogging about it.

She said all three.

I think we can also pin part of the blame on the pitchers themselves because I think they might be going Hollywood with their new TV show. Brad Lidge thinks he'll be ready to return next week. I truly don't know whether that's a good thing.

John Smoltz will also return to the majors next week, forcing the Red Sox to go with a temporary six-man rotation instead of banishing Daisuke Matsuzaka to the bullpen. It will work out somehow.

500th: I've always wondered why they hand out promotional giveaways at the beginning, rather than end, of the game. The trinkets should go to the real fans who stick it out. The Red Sox are using that tact tonight to commemorate Fenway's 500th consecutive sellout. Fans will get a picture coming in and a baseball going out. Cue Van Halen: "They gotcha goin' in. They gotcha comin' out. Same amount, woo! In 'n out."

{The fact that the Red Sox are celebrating this at all just seems lame to me. I'm all about giveaways, but read that blog post from the Globe - the organization is going overboard. What it comes down to is, the Red Sox have one of the smallest ballparks in baseball, thus fewer seats to sell, and an endless number of bandwagon fans who have been willing to shell out ridiculous amounts of money to watch a game there. It just smacks of an organization that is desperate, not one that has won two World Series since 2004.}

Tonight's games: We've had better starts - the Marlins scored first via a two-out walk, then an error, but at least the Sox came back with two runs in the 2nd inning and lead 2-1 in the 3rd. The Phillies also fell behind quickly, but haven't come back yet. They trail the Blue Jays 4-0 in the 3rd. Rod Barajas hit a solo home run. Christine hopes this game gets reset by rain.