Thursday night the Rays lost a game – to the likes of Seattle no less – giving the Sox a shot at cutting a half game off the Rays’ grip on the AL East. The Rays came back and won last night, the Sox dropped one to the pale Sox, and we now sit three-and-a-half back. Here at SG, we don’t “tip our caps” to the pitchers that beat our team, or shrug off a loss because we “got outpitched.” No sir. We point fingers, we assign blame, and we call out anyone and everyone who had a hand, or glove, in preventing a win.

Last night, the only person worthy of the goat horns was Dustin Pedroia, but he redeemed himself, and then some, with the only offense the Sox could muster. So today, we begrudgingly give props to Mark Buehrle, make sure nobody was watching as we tip our cap, and move on.

As is tradition when Red is away on one of his detox sessions or superhero role-playing weekends or wherever it is he goes, I like to drop a little of my own pop culture favorites into play. Today’s winner is Tea Leoni. Why? Why not. Just one of those “something about her” girls I have a thing for. And by thing, I mean restraining order.