Red Sox Magic Number - 33

The Red Sox magic number is now 33 and their lead in the AL East is back to 5 games.

In Boston the number 33 makes you think of just one person - Larry Bird. In the mid 1980's if you asked the average Bostonian about Bird the reply was likely to be, "Larry Bird is a God." Bird was a player whose greatness could not be expressed or understood by simply looking at his numbers. This season I heard a number of people compare Dirk Nowitzki to Larry Bird because Nowitzki's points per game and rebounds per game were similar. Just looking at the numbers just doesn't tell the story of how important and how great some players are. Dirk Nowitzki is no Larry Bird.

Back to the Red Sox - Tim Wakefield is now 15-10 on the season which means he has a decision in all 25 of the starts he made. His 15 wins puts him in a tie for the most wins in the AL so far this season and his ERA is now down to just 4.35 (which is just a shade over his career ERA of 4.30). Wakefield is now just 6 strikeouts behind Ron Guidry for 84th place on the all-time list. With probably 7 more starts this season - Wakefield has an outside shot at 20 wins this season. At the least he should top his career high of 17 wins he set in 1998.

JD Drew is driving me crazy. Sure he's hitting .339 in August but the last two games it has looked like he bet someone he could go entire games without taking a swing. Plus he hasn't hit a home run since June. JD Drew - I want to believe but he's making it damn hard on even the most optimistic fan like me.