Larry the Cable Guy is gone, and it didn't look like his bat would have helped the Seattle offense.

What will?

Well, Wladimir Balentien is batting fifth for the first time this season, Yuniesky Betancourt is back at shortstop - and he's batting .571 against Jon Lester.

Now, if Chris Jakubauskas can hold Boston.

We'll find out.

That's not fair

The Red Sox offense is a formidible one, but here in the first inning it was also a lucky one - unfortunate for Jakubauskas.
Jacoby Ellsbury doubled, but Dustin Pedroia, fooled by a pitch, rolled to third and advanced the runner. Jakubauska then shattered J.D. Drew's bat, but he blooped a single into shallow left field for a run.

Jakubauskas got out of the inning without futher damage.

One hard-hit ball, one run.

Red Sox 1, Mariners 0

That's two

Jeff Baily singled and when Jakubauskas centered a fastball, Ellsbury hammered it for an RBI triple.

It was a mistake pitch, and the Red Sox feast upon them.

In the second: Red Sox 2, Mariners 0

That's four - as in E-4

Red Sox loaded the bases with one out an Jakubauskas nearly got out of it. Nearly.

He got a ground ball from Julio Lugo, but after taking Adrian Beltre's throw at second, Jose Lopez threw low to first, skipping it by Russell Branyan.

Instead of an inning-ending double play, two more runs scored.

Boston is slip-sliding away.

After three: Red Sox 4, Mariners 0

That's one back

The Mariners have been squandering opportunities tonight - or Lester has been making them.

Leading off the fifth, however, Ichiro hit is third home run of the season to get Seattle off its big zero.

To this point, the biggest surprise of the game is Yuni, who has walked twice.

Let's see, that was two walks in his first 33 games, then two more in four innings of his 34th game.

After five: Red Sox 4, Mariners 1

Now that's a rally

Weird, weird inning, but Mariners scored twice on a Franklin Gutierrez two-run single, then Ichiro's second home run of the nightscored two more and put the Mariners ahead, 5-4.

Why weird?

With one out, Betancourt tapped back to the mound. Lester fielded it and looked at second, where Pedroia was waiting for the throw.

Instead of throwing it to start the double play, Lester turned to first and threw out Betancourt. All the run-scoring followed that play.

Sean White now pitching for Seattle.

After six: Mariners 5, Red Sox 4
That'll work, boys

White worked a scoreless seventh. Mark Lowe - hitting 98 mph with his fastball - took care of the eighth.

David Aardsma got through the ninth for his fourth save of the season, and the Mariners improbably beat the Red Sox.

Final score: Mariners 5, Red Sox 4

Ok, first of all, you'll notice that Larry the Cable Guy is here taking BP with the Mariners in full uniform, well his jersey had the sleeves cut off and by Junior and Mike Sweeney. Larry then scared everybody by putting it on the clubhouse. I've now seen him shirtless and may need electroshock therapy to remove that from my mind.

I will admit, he's not exactly my favorite stand-up comic. I'm prefer Louis CK, Robert Schimmel, Jim Jeffries or Zach Galifianakis.

But several Red Sox and Mariners players are big fans of his. Obviously when he met Roy Corcoran (pictured left), it was like two long lost brothers uniting.

Let's get to the Wakamatsu pregame meeting with the media.

The big news is that Brandon Morrow won't be handling the closing duties tonight.

"I talked to Brandon today, and told him what we are going to do with him is put him in the bullpen, not in the closer's role, but give him some innings and get him to where he feels he can command the baseball better," Wakamatsu said.

So who will be doing the closing?

Well .... "We're going to end up seeing on each individual game who's best avaible to close the game," Wakamatsu said. "Obviously Aardsma will be in there."

That sounds like the dreaded closer by committee to me. But at this point, that's what they feel is best, though my hunch is that nine times out of 10 you will see Aardsma in that role.

And there is no timetable for Morrow to return to the closing spot as of yet.

"We've basically told him if he goes out there and commands the baseball he's going to be successful and that will give us an indication of what that (return to closing) will be," Wakamatsu said.

"He knows its more about throwing the pitch where he wants to throw it and not falling behind and when he does that the confidence will come back," Wakamatsu said. "He seemed relieved in a sense. But he also knows he as some work to do."

The idea is get Morrow so more innings ... "whether its the fifth, sixth or seventh or multiple innings, let's get him out there pitching."

As for Yuni and his return to the line-up here's what Wak had to say.

"There's certain things in his game that he needs to clean up and improve on," Wakamatsu said.

And he isn't going to afraid to sit players, he told them so in a pregame meeting today.

"I'll sit guys at different times whether you are not playing to your ability or you need a break because of struggles," Wakamatsu said. "I think in his case it was a combination of both."

And make no mistake it was a benching for Yuni. Wakamatsu and his staff didn't let him know in advance he was sitting. When he got to the park both days and looked at the lineup is when he found out he wasn't playing and believe me that does send a message by doing it that way.

Here's Today's lineup -- thanks to Jeff Evans for sending it. You'll notice in the Red Sox lineup that David Ortiz is also not in the line-up, manager Terry Francona is giving him a day or two off because of his struggles at the plate.

Mariners
Ichiro RF
Jose Lopez 2B
Mike Sweeney DH
Adrian Beltre 3B
Wladimir Balentien LF
Russell Branyan 1B
Kenji Johjima C
Yuni Betancourt SS
Frankline Gutierrez CF
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Chris Jakubauskas P

Red Sox
Jacoby Ellsbury CF
Dustin Pedroia 2B
JD Drew RF
Jason Bay LF
Mike Lowell 3B
Rocco Baldelli DH
Julio Lugo SS
Jason Varitek C
Jeff Bailey 1B
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Jon Lester P