Worth the wait

At the beginning of last September I enjoined us all to, as I put it then, anticipate the following April (= wait til next year). And here we are. What a difference (um, lessee ...) eight months makes! According to mlb.com, the Red Sox, who at 16-8 have the best record in baseball, will have their biggest lead in the standings at the end of April in team history. They've taken five of six from the Yankees; closer Jonathan Papelbon has yet to give up a single run in April in his career; starter Jon Lester (coming back from non-Hodgkins lymphoma) is doing well in rehab, about to return; and Manny has only just begun to hit. Not only that, their $100,000,000 man Dice-K, while performing perfectly acceptably so far, is only the second most exciting Japanese pitcher on the team (all hail Hideki Okajima!).

Of course I've just gone and jinxed it. If there's anything about this team it's the ability to put together a string of inexplicable losses sometime in July or August. But you wouldn't want them to just run away with it, would you?