“Does Varitek throw any runners out?” my father-in-law asks, and I have to defend him. Like Wake’s knuckler, Lowe’s sinker is a tough pitch to dig out.

With two down, Nomar kicks a grounder from Jeter that should end the inning, and Sheffield takes Lowe out to left-center for a 7–2 lead.

The next inning, Pokey (Pokey!) muffs a double-play ball, and Tony Clark goes long. It’s 9–2, and all the runs have come from hired guns: Sheffield, Matsui, Clark. Lenny DiNardo is warming, and short of a miracle, this one’s done.

Ortiz homers, and the Yanks tack on a pair for an 11–3 final. It’s hard to blame Lowe entirely, when he got enough ground balls to at least keep things close. By now I expect the occasional error by Millar (wherever you put him), and Pokey’s got a splint on his thumb, but Nomar’s got to do better. And, with credit to Vazquez (another new hire), three runs don’t cut it in Yankee Stadium.

It’s just one game (just one of those games, like the one against the A’s, or the Dodgers, or the Phils), but we’re six and a half back and playing badly, and being embarrassed there annoys me even more.

SO: Getting beat by a horse like Matsui is one thing, getting beat by a BALCO Boy and the Ghost of Tony Clark is another.

June 30th

I didn’t want to write this down, but after last night’s crushing loss to the Yankees, I suppose I really ought to. About five days ago—just before my trip to Boston, anyway—I discovered a nearly perfect crow-shit Yankees logo on the windshield of my truck. This is a true thing I’m telling you.

You’re asking do I have photographic proof?

Are you crazy?

What the windshield washer wouldn’t take care of immediately, I got rid of with a filling-station squeegee just as fast as I could (and it took a distressing amount of elbow grease; those big woods crows shit hard). Itold myself it wasn’t an omen, but look at last night. Dick Cheney shows up in a Yankees hat, the Red Sox commit three more errors, the Yankees hitters are patient, the Red Sox hitters aren’t. Derek Lowe, who has lately shown signs of his old craftiness, last night looked like an escapee from that old Spielberg film The Goonies.