Foulke's health still a sore spot

It helps, of course, when the opposition is Cincinnati. The Reds have morphed from the Big Red Machine that broke Boston hearts in 1975 into a malfunctioning, misguided mess that has been outscored, 17-3, over the last two days and has offered little of interest other than a possible audition last night by reliever David Weathers, who struck out two of the three batters he faced and is certain to attract attention at the trading deadline.

Foulke, meanwhile, had been showing up in box scores lately about as often as Ramón Vázquez, the seldom-used benchman. His last save came June 5, when he nailed down a 6-3 win over the Angels, and he pitched just once on the swing through St. Louis and Chicago, when the Sox lost four of six games.

Considering how he grouses when he doesn't get regular work, even if it means the odd mopup assignment, the suspicion was raised that maybe all wasn't right with Foulke. And it wasn't.

Foulke's back problems, which flared up on at least two occasions last season, once causing him to miss a game in late August, had returned. Not that he would admit it, of course. This is, after all, the pitcher who claimed he went to Alabama for barbecue, his idea of a cute cover story for the visit he made with pitching coach Dave Wallace to the Sports Medicine Institute in Birmingham for a tuneup of his mechanics.

''I felt good today," he said when asked about the back.

But wasn't it an issue over the last week, since he hadn't pitched since last Wednesday in St. Louis?

''Go talk to someone else," he said. ''I don't talk about health. There haven't been many situations [to pitch]. I've been doing side work and long-toss."

He was slightly more forthcoming about a story in Sunday's Newark Star-Ledger that said Foulke spurned the Sox' request last winter that he undergo arthroscopic knee surgery. A club source confirmed that the possibility of a scope had been discussed but insisted that the club did not ''necessarily" make a recommendation and left the matter up to Foulke.