Sox stay up to speed

Some might say the shoes don't even deserve a mention, never mind a place of prominence on a clubhouse bulletin board maintained by equipment man Joe Cochran. But when you're winning the way the Sox are these days -- a season-best six in a row and 11 of 12 after Matt Clement happily accepted a 5-0 lead after three innings and breezed to his ninth win in 10 decisions -- credit tends to be dispensed in the oddest directions.

But it's not hard to draw a straight line between Wakefield and the position the Sox now find themselves in, with Manny Ramirez's seventh home run in 11 games and 18th of the season, coming in the ninth inning yesterday, almost an afterthought in a victory that pushed the Sox 1 1/2 games ahead of the fast-fading Baltimore Orioles in the American League East.

''Wow, you're really going out on a limb with that one, considering that was the first game in this stretch," said a mocking Mike Myers, the Sox reliever who got in some brief exercise yesterday (two batters, a walk and a whiff) in relief of Clement, who turned in a seven-inning, seven-hit, no-walk performance and likely would have held the Phillies scoreless if Ramirez had run a fly route instead of a post pattern while in pursuit of Chase Utley's RBI double in the seventh.

On June 12, the night Wakefield averted a sweep in Chicago by putting the clamps on the Cubs with seven strong innings while impressing teammates with his hook slide, the Sox began the day three games over .500 and four games behind the Orioles in the East. Now they're a season-best 13 games over .500 and emanating a sense of inevitability to the notion that they will soon be well ahead of the O's, who probably were playing over their heads all along but are now playing ridiculously shorthanded because of injuries.

''That was a big game," said Sox manager Terry Francona of Wakefield's win. ''I remember going to [his daughter's high school] graduation thinking, I don't want to say we averted disaster, but we were scuffling, really struggling, and Wake comes out and not only pitches well, but ends up running the bases like that, which was something out of the ordinary.

''I thought there was a little extra meaning to that game. Winning is huge, but sometimes how you win a game gives you an extra push."