What Has Become Of Daniel Bard?

Sometimes baseball and in turn life doesn't make any sense.

On a day when John Lackey actually pitched decently-one of his best outings of the season mind you-ace setup man Daniel Bard failed to protect a lead once again as the Boston Red Sox lost 5-4 to the Toronto Blue Jays at Fenway Park in an afternoon matinee.

They dodged a bullet as the Tampa Bay Rays lost 6-2 to the Baltimore Orioles tonight at Camden Yards, meaning that Boston remains four games ahead of Tampa Bay in the AL Wild Card race.

Bard (2-8; most losses of any reliever in MLB) has had a disastrous week with three terrible appearances in a row. That is nothing but bad news for the Red Sox (86-62) who count perhaps way too much on him. With an already taxed bullpen (since the rotation is a mess), Terry Francona has little choice but to hope Bard somehow finds his control again and works out of his funk.

Summoned to protect a 4-2 lead in the top of the eighth, Bard allowed three runs (two earned) on a hit with two walks. It was his fifth blown save of the season. Jonathan Papelbon looked great in the ninth (in a non-save situation), going 1-2-3 with two strikeouts. It's time for him to do something that Francona avoids at all costs: go for saves that are longer than an inning.

The goodwill from Tim Wakefield's 200th win seemed to carry over to the series finale as Lackey pitched into the sixth and even left with a lead (3-2). He went 5.1 innings, allowing two earned runs on seven hits with a walk and four strikeouts. He is the punching bag of New England and I've already made countless negative jokes and comments about him this season but he didn't deserve that today.

Blue Jays (75-74) ace Ricky Romero (15-10) beat Boston for the second time in a week, a huge accomplishment for a guy that normally gets rocked Lackey-style (there it goes) when he takes the mound against them. Thanks to a low pitch count, he lasted eight innings and allowed four runs (three earned) on six hits with a walk and four strikeouts.

Toronto closer Frank Francisco also normally struggles against the Red Sox but he put his career numbers aside today with a 1-2-3 ninth with two strikeouts for his 15th save of the season.

The Blue Jays grabbed a 2-0 lead in the first on RBI singles by Edwin Encarnacion (2 hits) and Kelly Johnson.

Boston tied it in the second with ground outs from Ryan Lavarnway and Jason Varitek.

Marco Scutaro's sacrifice fly in the third (scoring Jacoby Ellsbury who extended his hit streak to 18 games with a triple) and Adrian Gonzalez's solo shot in the sixth (his 26th of the season; first at Fenway since July 7) gave the Red Sox a 4-2 lead. That's when everything quickly fell apart (a common theme lately with Boston).

First, Gonzalez left in the seventh with tightness in his left calf. Two walks and an error on Bard to start the eighth gave Toronto the bases loaded with no outs. J.P. Arencibia's ground out scored Encarnacion to cut it to 4-3 and then Adam Loewen delivered the key hit of the game: a two-run single.

There are 14 games left in the season and Tampa Bay comes to town tomorrow night for the start of a four-game series. The pitching matchups are Kyle Weiland vs. Jeremy Hellickson on Thursday night, Josh Beckett vs. James Shields on Friday night, Jon Lester vs. Jeff Niemann on Saturday afternoon and Tim Wakefield vs. David Price on Sunday afternoon.

As a Red Sox fan, do you feel confident about any of those? Beckett is making his first start in over a week after spraining his ankle and the Rays knocked Lester around last weekend at the Trop. The only solace is that they'll still be ahead when Tampa Bay leaves, barring a sweep at home and they won't see them again this year.

The good news is that eight of the last 14 games are at home and even better, seven of them are against the O's. If the Red Sox can't hang on to a four-game lead with 14 remaining then they have nobody to blame but themselves and they wouldn't go anywhere in the playoffs anyway. The next two weeks should be a real test of this possibly great team's character.

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