Play it again, slam

Anyone else. Teams facing the Red Sox would rather face anyone else with the game on the line than Big Papi David Ortiz. His list of game winning homers with the Red Sox reached 6 Saturday when he won the game in the bottom of the 10th with a 2 run home run giving the Sox a 5-3 win over the Philadelphia Phillies that was their 8th win in a row.

Oh, and by the way, your Uncle Buck loves Red Sox fans. LOVES Red Sox fans. UB was doing some driving errands Saturday and listening to the Sox game on the radio when Jason Varitek lined out to end the 1st inning. All of the sudden you can hear Sox fans go bananas (B-A-N-A-N-A-S) booing. Radiocaster Joe Castiglione quickly mentions that the boos are for Phillies pitcher Brent Myers. And here's why:

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BOSTON Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Brett Myers was arrested early this morning in Boston. He's charged with hitting his wife in the face on a street not far from Fenway Park, where the Phils open a weekend series tonight. Myers pleaded not guilty to assault charges at today's arraignment in Boston Municipal Court, according to a spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney's office. Prosecutors say Myers was arguing with his wife shortly after midnight. The woman and two witnesses tell police the 25-year-old pitcher hit her. And one witness says Myers also pulled his wife's hair (BTW Myers' wife bailed him out after only 1-2 hours in lockup for a only $200). Myers' next court date is August fourth.

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Isn't that great. The Sox fans went to the game already knowing that the team was facing a wife beater and decided to show this dick what they thought about a coward like that who beats women.

UB had an immediate flashback to former Sox utility tool Wil Cordero who was run out of town after Red Sox fans learned he was arrested for assaulting his wife. Police said he slapped her, hit her on the head with a phone, and threatened to kill her back in 1997. Immediately the Sox fans started laying it on Cordero and he was gone soon after, and booed every time he came back to Fenway.

But back to Saturday's game, it was Cordero's former teammate Tom Gordon who gave up the game winning home run to Ortiz. Not that the Sox haven't picked on Gordon since he left Boston with a bum arm (see Yankoffs), but it is always fun to have the better of a player that left, lord knows UB has seen enough players that come back and burn the Sox (see Yankoffs).

Curt Schilling and...

Josh Beckett (Friday) gave the Sox back to back good starts. Beckett took a perfect game into the 6th, in what many were calling his best outing of the year. Closer Jonathan Papelbon improved to 2-1 Saturday with 2.1 tough innings, where he got out of jams that would have sunk the Sox. After Saturday's game Schilling compared Paps to Yankoff closer Mariano Rivera, in the context that teams fear that if they don't score by the 8th, they won't have much of a chance in the 9th. "He allows managers to treat the 6-7-8th like the 7-8-9th and that's a huge advantage," Schilling said.

Spider-Man 3 starring Manny Ramirez...