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WILD THINGS
With the Yankees and Red Sox Series coming up this week the only place you are going to see Joba Chamberlain and Josh Beckett are on the Yankee Classics. You see both starters are unavailable for this series.
Joba is currently on the DL with rotary cuff problems while Beckett has come up lame in the elbow department. Right-handed starter Tim Wakefield, who has been sidelined since Aug. 7 with tightness behind his right shoulder, threw a side session on Saturday and was pronounced ready to return from the disabled list. He will be activated from the 15-day DL on Tuesday to pitch against New York in place of Beckett. The Yanks will send left Andy Petttitte to the mound against him.
Sitting five games behind Boston in the AL wild card race, the Yankees welcome the Red Sox to Yankee Stadium for the final time beginning on Tuesday, when two of baseball's most storied franchises open a crucial three-game series.
New York (70-60) has won more than 63 percent of its nearly 800 home games against the Red Sox since the venue opened its doors in April 1923. That includes perhaps the most distinguished game in the longstanding rivalry, when the Yankees stunned the Red Sox in a come-from-behind win in Game 7 of the 2003 AL championship series, extending Boston's World Series title drought to 86 years.
But the Red Sox (75-55) have won two championships since then, while the Yankees have lost their last four postseason series starting with the 2004 ALCS to Boston. If New York has designs on extending its 13-year playoff streak -- and extending the closing date of Yankee Stadium past Sept. 21 -- its fate may depend greatly on the next three games.