"The World Turned Upside Down"

...which was, of course, the tune the British played when their army surrendered to Washington at Yorktown.

Blimey, what a lark!  I can't imagine why anyone objected to our glorious trip across the pond.  Two wins, mate, against those wankers from Boston!  Cheerio, what?  Why I love EVERYTHING about London!

Clotted cream?  More like clotted heaven!  Scones?  Yes, please.  And I don't know why they call them crumpets...how about, "scrumpets"???

All right, all right, let's simmer down.

In many ways, this was indeed the world turned upside down, and there were both good and bad indicators about whether it will turn back again in America.

—Luis Cessa, with 4 scoreless innings against the Red Sox.  Terrific!  Don't expect to ever see it again on this side of the Atlantic.  If Coops were smart, he'd deal him immediately for some magic beans.  (Coops is not smart.)

—Hicks, after swinging at a ridiculous pitch with the bases loaded to kill an early rally, redeemed himself with two key, late ribbies.  Let's hope it's a good sign.

—Bogaerts was back, and homered, so I guess we lost the injury battle.  Great.  On the other hand, this will probably keep Voit from injuring himself even worse in the All-Star Game nonsense.  And  it might mean another shot for Ford, or maybe...Mc-BROOM!

—Encarnacion, even in that band box, 1-10 with a double, a walk, and 5 strikeouts.  No walking the bird around the bases. Hey, the falcon cannot hear the falconer.  Things fall apart, and this rough beast  is slouching toward an early retirement.

—Jack Curry said outright that the Sox cannot win with that bullpen as is.  True.  But an ominous sign was seeing Steven Wright out there, baffling the Yanks as usual.  Who needs a bullpen (in a short series) with a knuckleballer?

—Curry also told us that neither Happ nor CC started today "for some reason."  Those were very, very good reasons.  This was the perfect place for CC to hurt himself.  And Happ?  Well, who besides Red Sox fans really wanted to see Boston score 20 runs?  In the first inning?

Bottom line:  we survived this nonsense, and even prospered.  Better than I could have hoped.

Now back to the reality...which starts with the fact that Luis Severino has had a "setback"...and probably won't pitch until September.

But more on that later.  For now, Bob's yer uncle, BoSox.