Both Clay Buchholz and Jason Bay weren't feeling quite right last night, but somehow emerged as the heroes of Friday night's series opener against the Baltimore Orioles.
Buchholz's six strong innings, combined with Bay's 34th home run of the year, lifted the Red Sox past the Birds, 3-1.
With just under three weeks left in the regular season, the field is almost done filling out, with just five teams holding real hopes of reaching the post season: Boston, New York, Detroit, Minnesota, and Los Angeles.
Anaheim is up 6 in the West, Detroit is up 4 on Minnesota in the Central, the Red Sox are up 6 ½ in the Wild Card and the Yanks are about to clinch the East, up 6.5 games.
So, how do these teams stack up?
With the recent signing of shortstop prospect Jose Iglesias, the Sox now have four shortstops among their top 20 prospects.
Soxprospects.com rates the 19 year-old Cuban defector as the 14th best prospect in the organization and second-best prospect behind #12 Yamaico Navarro, third-best if you include Casey Kelly.
The 5-11, 175 pound infielder rates very well with the glove, with at least one scout grading it an 80 on the 20-80 scouting scale, according to Kiley McDaniel of Baseball Prospectus. His arm rates as a plus, as does his range, though his speed is of debate to some scouts.