Rain and Rallies

WMYM is planning on being out in Charm City itself at tonight's Jon Lester-Manny Ramirez homer No. 500 Orioles extravaganza, but we're not sure how much baseball we'll be watching. That's because the most serious thunderstorms to hit the nation's capital region swooped in earlier this afternoon, dropping lightning bolts and buckets of rain and throwing the very existence of tonight's game into question, since pockets of rain are expected to keep hovering around the area all night. Not a pleasant forecast, to be honest, so if anyone else in the area might head out there, it's probably worth monitoring Extra Bases.

Of course, there are pleasantries to discuss, after the Sox rallied to take an extra-inning win on the road from Camden Yards last night. While Josh Beckett wasn't as dominant as he often is and struggled with his control, walking the bases full in his final inning, he also did what he tends to do best: He got the outs when he needed to and shut down Baltimore's chances at big innings.

That's what stoppers do: they stop the bleeding. And Beckett sopped the bleeding on the road pretty well last night. Of course, that begs the next question: Will the Sox be able to build on road success for a change, or will be just another blip on what has so far been a horrendous road resume. Lester certainly has the talent to do so, and if he does, he'll do so in an intriguing matchup. Baltimore's Garrett Olson has been terrific early, and the Red Sox will have to hit better than they have outside of Fenway all year to break through his teflon.

They'll also have to do it with efficient pitching, since nearly the entire bullpen made a cameo in last night's 13-inning face off. Hideki Okajima had an inning, Javier Lopez and Craig Hansen combined to put up a frame, Manny Delcarmen had his say, Mike Timlin showed up in the 12th and Jonathan Papelbon shut things down at the end of the road. Put all that together, and things start to look like a perfect opportunity for a multiple-inning Papelbon outing if Boston has a lead tonight. Remember, he'd hardly pitched in a week and a half before last night's quick 1-2-3 inning.

STARTING PITCHING: √
He wasn't perfect, but Beckett did what he's shown he's best at the past two seasons: He got the job done. Inside Edge was hardly blown away - they graded him at a B - but he did have a couple really impressive marks: Overall Effectiveness and Battle Tendency. Look, if you make WMYM pick two categories to have a pitcher excel in, we'll take Battle Tendency as one of them every single time.

MIDDLE RELIEF: √+
Manny Delcarmen, Javier Lopez, Craig Hansen ... all the young guys got the job done last night. In fact, with the exception of the melodrama brought by Delcarmen and Timlin, things cruised along quite nicely. That's exactly what you want from this bunch, and what people came to expect last year from Boston's excellent corps.

SET-UP RELIEF: N/A
Hard to call Timlin a set up reliever, since he wasn't in a set-up situation, which is why we lumped him in with the category above.

CLOSER: √+
Can't go wrong with a 1-2-3 Papelbon outing, even if the lead was a bit more luxurious than he planned on, to be sure.

LINEUP: -
They just didn't take advantage of so many of the opportunities that were thrown in front of them. Whether it was squandering runners on base - didn't it seem like Jacoby Ellsbury was on the base paths all night - or blowing extra outs earlier in the game, it took the top of the 13th inning for Boston to finally come through, thanks to some horrendous Orioles defense. Accordingly, that's why you see Inside Edge grade the whole evening as a C, and to be fair, it's hard to argue otherwise. A nice game from Ellsbury, a nice game from David Ortiz and, eventually, a slump-busting hit from Kevin Youkilis aside, better things are expected from the Boston hitters, to be sure.

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