You don't need Matt Noyes after this steamy night in Fenway to tell you what lies ahead. The forecast calls for champagne showers - perhaps as soon as tonight, with the probability of a drenching growing stronger every day between now and Sunday.
But you might want to check with a travel agent regarding flights to Anaheim, Calif., next weekend, if you are entertaining the prospect of following the Red Sox through the first round of the American League playoffs.
The immediate future came into focus for the Sox with last night's 11-6 win over the Oakland Athletics. Their magic number to clinch the AL East and win their first division title since 1995 is down to 2 - any combination of Sox wins and Yankee losses totaling that number and the Sox will have captured the division.
And with the Angels being routed by Texas, the last-place Rangers completing a three-game sweep, the Sox are now virtually certain of meeting the Angels in the first round of the playoffs. The Angels are on the verge of being eliminated from the race for best record in the league; if that distinction falls to either the Indians or Red Sox, the Angels will play the Sox in the first round, because the Indians will play the AL East wild-card entry.
"Down in Tampa we didn't want to get too far ahead of ourselves," said reliever Mike Timlin, who emerged with the win after the Sox broke a 5-all tie by scoring six runs against an Oakland bullpen that ran out a series of who dats after the Sox knocked around starter Joe Blanton for 11 hits in five innings. "We were glad we got the playoff berth, but we didn't want to overdo it. I'm sure we'll let it out a little bit. [A celebration] kind of plans itself."
It appears the Sox will open at Fenway Park against the Angels Wednesday or Thursday; Game 3 and Game 4 (if necessary) in the best-of-five series would be played Sunday and Monday in Anaheim.
"You figure we've got to split our last four games," said third baseman Mike Lowell, who drove in five runs to blow by Butch Hobson for most RBIs by a Sox third baseman, Lowell now with 116 to Hobson's previous club record of 112 in 1977. "We feel pretty good about that, especially with Josh [Beckett] going tomorrow. We're all excited about it. We want to do it.
"We definitely still have something to play for the last four games."
Manny Ramírez, meanwhile, demonstrated for the second straight night that he can miss 24 games without putting a hitch in his swing. Ramírez had three singles and a walk, scoring twice, before giving way to rookie Brandon Moss, who came in as a pinch runner, scored on Lowell's two-run single in the sixth, then singled in a run (his first big league RBI) and eventually scored on a wild pitch in the seventh.
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