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More on Wakefiled's perfect outing

Red Sox pitcher Tim Wakefield worked five perfect innings in a minor league game for the PawSox this afternoon. Since Boston released his personal batterymate, Doug Mirabelli, last Thursday, the team felt it would be best to have Wakefield and catcher Kevin Cash worked together in a minor league game instead of traveling to Bradenton today.

Wakefield struck out three and threw 64 pitches (48 strikes).

"Today was as good as I have ever seen him pitch," said Cash, who also caught Wakefield last season when Mirabelli was on the DL. "I don't care who he's facing, when he's down i nthe zone, he's hard to hit."

The PawSox played to a 1-1 tie with Louisville.

Posted by Joe McDonald  at 2:46 PM | Permalink | Comments 0

Wakefield perfect

Buddy Steve Hyder, the PawSox' broadcaster, just called from Fort Myers with an outstanding report on Red Sox pitcher Tim Wakefield. The knuckler, starting for the PawSox today in order to get comfortable with new batterymate Kevin Cash, tossed five perfect innings. He threw 63 pitches (47) strikes.

Doug who?

I'll have more later. . . Thanks, Steve.

Posted by Joe McDonald  at 2:00 PM | Permalink | Comments 1

Beckett update

Red Sox manager Terry Francona just made it oficial that Josh Beckett will not travel to Japan with the rest of the team on Wednesday. Instead, the right-hander will stay in Florida to continue to rehab his ailing back.

"He will not go to Japan, which I think we're using common sense," said Francona. "We're trying to do things in the correct order, and he completely understands."

Beckett played catch with pitching coach John Farrell back in Fort Myers this morning and Francona said the pitcher felt no pain. Beckett played catch at 60 feet and then progressed to 75 on flat ground with "no concerns."

"He did fine," said Francona this morning from Bradenton where the Red Sox will face the Pirates. "He had no concerns and that's what we were shooting for. He'll ramp it up a little more (Monday)."

Beckett will play long toss on Tuesday, and best case scenario, he'll throw a side session on Thursday. Farrell reported to Francona and told the manager the ball came out of Beckett's hand good.

There's still no timetable on his return at this point, but the Red Sox will use caution and progress slowly with this.

While the Red Sox are barnstorming around the globe, Beckett will remain at the spring training facility. The team is trying to figure out which members of the medical and training staff will stay behind to work with Beckett at City of Palms Park. There was some discussion about sending him back to Boston, but the team decided it was best to keep him in Florida, probably for the warm weather.

If he continues to progress, there is a possibility he could make a minor-league rehab start.

Posted by Joe McDonald  at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments 0

Sunday lineups

The Red Sox are in Bradenton to face the Pirates today.

BOSTON
Julio Lugo, DH
Dustin Pedroia, 2b
Kevin Youkilis, 3b
Manny Ramirez, lf
Bobby Kielty, rf
Sean Casey, 1b
Jacoby Ellsbury, cf
Alex Cora, ss
Dusty Brown, c
Kyle Snyder, SP

Posted by Joe McDonald  at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments 0