Red Sox 3, Orioles 4: The East Is Tied

If you are on board with laying down to the Orioles to hurt the Yankees, this game went about as well as could be hoped.

First, the Red Sox lost. I know, I know, it's a little off to be reveling in that, but today the Yankees did too, and you know what that means? A tie atop the American League East. The Red Sox may not control their own destiny anymore (actually, that destiny has been decided for a while now), but they certainly seem to control New York's.

Beyond that, though, it was a pretty decent way to lose, particularly because of Felix Doubront. No, he wasn't untouchable, surrendering four runs (three earned) and two homers in seven innings, but he did pick up another 10 strikeouts after recording 11 in his last outing, and looked good doing it for the most part. It's hard to be fully confident in him heading to 2013, but it's not impossible like it was a few weeks ago.

Really, that's all you can ask for from the Sox right about now. Salty unloaded a two-run shot which is either a good or bad way for the Sox to score depending on how you view both his future with the team and his pursuit of Fisk's record. Junichi Tazawa had a typical Tazawa inning with a strikeout and no baserunners. We even got to see Mark Reynolds fall over the tarp making a grab for the Orioles.

Add in some good old fashioned Yankee hating schadenfreude, and yeah, I'll take this any day.