All the Sox could do yesterday after a deflating 1-5 trek through New York and Atlanta was hope their latest lopsided defeat, a 10-4 crusher to the Braves, would serve as a chapter-closing bookend to the May 27 debacle. But hope was hard to come by after yet another maddening meltdown by Derek Lowe.
In a jarring collapse that inspired the harshest public comments to date by manager Terry Francona about one of his players, Lowe utterly squandered a 4-1 lead by allowing the Braves seven runs in the fifth inning before 41,414 at Turner Field. The Braves scored two more runs in the frame against Jimmy Anderson in his Sox debut.
"It can't happen," Francona said, referring to Lowe's sudden loss of effectiveness. "He's got a pitching coach that has confidence in him. He has a manager that has confidence in him. I think he has [teammates] who have confidence in him. But at some point he has to do it."
Lowe, who has managed only five quality starts in 16 outings and has allowed at least seven runs in six of them, surrendered a career-high eight earned runs in just 4 1/3 innings. Last Tuesday, he coughed up a career-high nine runs in an 11-3 loss to the Yankees. His ERA over his last three starts is a whopping 9.37.
Asked if he has considered moving Lowe to the bullpen, Francona said, "Who are you going to start? If you come up with a guy who can win a lot of games . . . "
Francona left the rest unspoken, though his patience with Lowe's inconsistency has grown short.
"It's happened a lot. Too much," Francona said. "Today we're in a game where we need to win desperately and come off a horrible road trip with a chance to win two in a row, but one inning and the game is out of reach."
As a consequence, the Sox flew home trailing the Rangers by 2 1/2 games in the wild-card race and leading the third-place Devil Rays by only 2 1/2 games in the division. They have lost five of their last six series, hardly a recipe for success.
