This one stings

Did anyone else see the Sox' 10-9 loss tonight? I feel like I jumped into a time warp and came out in 2003 - complete with the terrible pitching, the crazy comeback, the exciting offense, the late-innings drama, and the end-of-game meltdown.

This is the first really stinging loss of the season, IMO - a chance to sweep a good team on the road squandered due to, for the most part, bad luck.

I feel for Papelbon. Take a look at how it went down:

• A check-swing with 2 strikes that only resulted in an infield hit because it rolled so slowly
• An indecisive butcher-job by Lugo letting there be runners on 1st & 2nd with 0 out. It's easy to be angry with Lugo, although this was also a bit of bad luck - everyone watching the game was thinking 'lead runner,' but once again the ball was rolling slowly which really screwed things up.
• A successful bunt
• A simple 4-3 ground-out, which resulted in a run due to the aforementioned bad luck -> Tie game
  
• A little broken bat flair into very shallow left -> Loss

Papelbon was pretty good, things just rolled out of control with the crucial moment being the Lugo play and the subsequent sac bunt. Oddly enough, 'small ball,' which had been shooting Detroit in the foot all night (remember Magglio getting thrown out running to 3rd in the 8th? or the bunt with 2 on and 0 out while in the lead that resulted in 0 runs?), came back to be the deciding factor in the end, as without that bunt the tying run would not have scored. Go figure.

The only real questionable managerial decision I think was whether or not to intentionally walk Granderson w/ runners on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out, but I still think they made the right call by pitching to him. Granderson was struggling (he continued to struggle with a weak groundout that just so happened to drive in the tying run) and you never want to create a situation where you can walk in the tying run or winning run.

This doesn't suck as much as it would have in the pre-World Championship days, but it still stinks. Gotta have some of these days though - it's all part of the journey of baseball season.

On to the next phase of the road trip.

EDIT: Also: That game was Four. Hours. Long. Eff that.