Leaving on a Jet Plane.

Leaving Fenway, Josh Beckett dons a snappy pin-striped suit:

Pedroia pulls off a tan and mint green combination(while wife Kelli goes with a drab gray sweater dress, matching gray boots that are too big and don't have a heel, and an over-sized black bag):

But Papelbon? Papelbon chooses the always classic look of an untucked white shirt and jeans:

And in the End.

Baseball is like the boy you meet when you get a job selling ice cream to tourists during a hot, sticky-sweet, teenaged summer. He's cute. He makes you laugh. He keeps you amused through the long, grueling hours and through the boring, dull ones when it's pouring rain out. And that's all that he needs to be and all that he he needs to do.

A summer fling is uncomplicated. It's easy. It's simple. It's about right now and what will make me happy right now. And like baseball, a summer fling is destined to end in September heartache.

But even knowing that there isn't going to be a happy ending, you launch yourself into it because it's fun. You get swept up in the excitement. And, for awhile, nothing else really matters. Because you can see the end before it even gets started, you can go full-bore and throw yourself into it with complete and utter abandon-no inhibitions, no expectations to live up to-with your summer love (and baseball) you can just be. Quirky side exposed, you can be as obsessive, as irresponsible, and as superstitious as you want to be.

No matter how earth-shatteringly monumental and important a summer romance can seem, though, it's really just fluff. If it wasn't fluff, then it wouldn't end the way it does. If the relationship had meaning, there'd by a knock-down-drag-'em-out fight to signal it's demise. Instead, both baseball and the summer fling just sort of peter out. One week you see each other nearly every day and the next *poof* they're gone.

With vague promises to keep in touch, and no real goodbye, you find that you've drifted apart. And all you're left with is memories. They might be memories of romantic endeavors like taking out the trash together or seeing who can stay in the walk-in freezer longest (I might have mentioned before that I had a bit of a problem with being a dare-devil when I was younger) or they might be Lester's no-hitter, Manny's home run, or that ridiculous game against Texas. But they're all that remains of summer and it's sad.

Don't get me wrong, I look forward to the post-season as much as anyone. And, if you're lucky, you get the conclusion. You get the final goodbye before everyone heads off in different directions. But post-season play is bittersweet. It's a prolongation of the inevitable: each new game could be the season's last gasp. The end of summer is nipping at your heels and post-season ball is a few last stolen moments before they shut the ice cream shop down for the winter. It's the birthday card the sweet boy sends to you even though you haven't spoken in six weeks. You're not supposed to have those moments; so, they should be both cherished and greedily hoarded.

To put it in a more adult context: a lot can happen during the course of a summer (summer loosely meaning the baseball season.) People are born. People get married. People die. But there's always baseball. It's constant background buzz forms the soundtrack of summer. It becomes a comfortable place to anchor our lives. Michael's sister's baby was born when the Sox were in Japan. My old college roommate was married when they played St. Louis. My Uncle was diagnosed with cancer when they were in Tampa in April and his funeral was when they played the White Sox at the end of August.

It's fourth of July weekend with the family on Block Island with Lester going nine shut-out innings against the Yankees. It's Sunday afternoon birthday barbecues on the beach accompanied by the dulcet tones of Joe Castiglione. It's going out to dinner on a blind date, noticing that the game is on in the bar, and covertly trying to follow it. It's watching the game with a few friends and a steady supply of cold beer at a bar. It's watching the game on a warm night with a rapidly warming beer and nearly thirty-eight thousand strangers.

Baseball does this to me every year. I'm happily following along when, suddenly, like a kick in the teeth, September is over. MLB or Father Time or some Supreme Being leans over my shoulder and announces: Ok. We're done now. Hope you had fun. C'mon, you didn't notice the chill in the air or the leaves changing? No. I was busy. I'm left with a hollow feeling and a sense of "What do I do now?" I suppose hibernation is an option.

The photos in the slide show are from AP, Getty, and Reuters. The music is Beethoven, Op. 43 'Prometheus Overture' (at least, the first four minutes of it, there's another minute that got cut off.)

No. 6

There was little love for Johnny Pesky in my father's house when he was growing up. My Grandfather was a Ted Williams fan. My Father, as a tendency to be contrary seems to run in my family, was a Dom Dimaggio man (with very little prodding, he'll bust out in a song about how Dom is better than his brother Joe.) It's not that they had anything against Pesky. But Pesky? Pesky makes my Dad feel guilty.

When my Dad was three, his family moved to Southern Connecticut so that my Grandfather could go to Yale. They were still there when my Dad started school. One day all the little boys in his class were excitedly talking about how there was going to be a real live baseball player at the grand opening of a new car dealership in town. And he'd be signing autographs. And you could go and get an autograph from the real, live baseball player. My Dad convinced his Father to take him. Undoubtedly, my Grandfather didn't want to go but everybody makes sacrifices for their kids.

To hear my Dad tell it (and the story probably comes embedded with a huge dose of nostalgia), it was perfect. The signing was on a Saturday, so the day before he and his mom took the trolley into New Haven (which was a treat in itself) so they could go to a sporting goods store to buy a baseball. He spent a long time looking at the balls, trying to find the perfect one. The leather couldn't be scuffed or nicked. The stitching couldn't be frayed. Knowing my Dad and his tendency toward perfectionism and his bull-dogged determination, they were probably there for awhile. Eventually, though, he found a baseball that would do.

The next morning, he was up and ready to leave before the dawn. But his mom made him eat breakfast first; which he accomplished as quickly as one can eat hot oatmeal without severly burning one's mouth. But then his Dad made him wait until he'd read the entire newspaper, front to back. Finally, they could go.

It was November. The wind had a little bit of a bite to it but is was clear and the sun was shining, so they walked. Or, rather, my Grandfather walked and my Dad bounced along beside him. My father started out carrying his virgin baseball but once it became clear that he was too excited to 'walk normally' the ball was confiscated and stowed in my Grandfather's jacket pocket for safe keeping.

They made it to the car dealership without further incident. They got in the really, really long line and waited. And waited. To pass the time, my father asked my grandfather about who the real life baseball player: what position did he play? was he any good? When they finally got to the front of the line, my Dad was star-struck. The ballplayer called him 'sport' and asked him what position he played but my Dad couldn't manage an answer. He signed the ball and sent my Dad on his way.

Once they got home, the ball was given a place of honor on the top of my Dad's bookcase and there it sat until they moved back to Boston a few years later. He still has the ball and he's quick to defend it: I was only five. I didn't know any better.

The ballplayer signing that day? Enos Slaughter. The Enos Slaughter who scored the winning run in the 1946 World Series while Johnny Pesky held the ball. And what's more, at that point he was a member of the Yankees.

My Grandfather never told my Dad who Enos Slaughter was. But once he found out the ball found a new home in a shoe box in his closet. He still feels bad about it, though. The ball and Johnny Pesky make my Dad feel as if he still has to prove his fandom. Most sincere congratulations to Johnny Pesky anyway, from me and my Dad.

Simply Awesome.

Red Sox clinch themselves a spot in the playoffs and, thereby, knock the Yankees out. They do it by beating the best pitcher in baseball. All is right in the world. And the Chili's mojo is still perfect.

Playing Hookey.

Friday afternoon may be the perfect time to skip out of work early. Not because the weather is supposed to be fabulous (it isn't) but because the International Institute of Boston, Lowell, and Manchester is giving Mike Lowell their Golden Door Award at a Fenway Park luncheon that will be open to the public.

Happy Birthday Jason Bay!

Happy thirtieth to Jason Bay.

Like all Canadians, he seems to be a perfectly good, respectful, respectable, upstanding soul. When he first came over the reporters repeatedly tried to get him to badmouth Pittsburgh but he wouldn't do it. He seems like a calm, understated, all-around good guy. He strikes out a little too much for my taste but what do I know?

Here's to a happy birthday and many more for the polite Canadian.

Poor Mikey.

Mike Lowell has been playing with a partially torn right acetabular labrum since late June.

The hip is a ball-and-socket joint. The head of the femur is the ball and the acetabulum is the name for the socket. Acetabulum comes from the Latin for 'cup' and is, essentially, a shallow indentation in the pelvic bone. It's a feature of the bone designed to give the femur a place to rest and the hip joint a place to work it's magic.

But the socket has to be shallow. If the femur was really jammed into the joint, the range of motion would be lessened. But if it was too shallow, there would be little to hold it in place and it would be easier for the ball to slip out and dislocate the joint-which is extremely painful. That's where the labrum comes into play.

The labrum is a collar-like ring of cartilage that sits on top of the socket. It's function is to make the joint a little bit deeper and help prevent dislocation. When a labrum tears, it becomes harder for it to function usefully. It becomes easier for the joint to slide around (subluxation) or for it to become completely dislocated.

Since they used the word partially to describe his injury and since he still has the use of his right leg, one can probably assume that the labrum is still mostly attached. The pain he's experiencing is probably just subluxation of the joint. But from the look of the pain he's in, it's probably a significant tear (and not just bits of broken off cartilage floating around in the joint.)

The injury shouldn't get significantly worse if he keeps playing. But he'll likely need someone to go in with an arthroscope within a few days of the season ending to patch it up.

*The illustration is from Gray's Anatomy and because Gray's is old, it's labeled as the cotyloid ligament. Also, fair warning: google image searches for acetabular labrum are not for the faint of heart.