Fausto, Sans Devil, Beats Beckett

Faustus is Latin for "auspicious" ... so Fausto must mean the same thing, maybe? My spanish is not adequate. Remember when the Indians wanted to make Fausto Carmona a closer? Oh, those wacky coaches. The last time Carmona faced the Red Sox — last season — he blew two consecutive save opportunities. On Wednesday as a starter, he threw eight shutout innings to beat Josh Beckett, 1-0. Let's go to the vital statistics: Carmona is 13-4; 5-0 with 1.57 ERA in July. He hasn't allowed a run in 18 straight innings.

By the way, it was the first road loss for Beckett since Sept., 2006. Franklin Gutierrez had a solo homer in the third. Fun fact: Cleveland hasn't followed a 1-0 loss with a 1-0 win since 1942. Other fun fact: Since 2002, Carmona has been a Bee (Burlington), a Scrapper (Mahoning Valley), a Captain (Lake County), an Aero (Akron), a Bison (Buffalo) and an Indian (Kinston and Cleveland). And he's only 23.

• A Tad Presumptuous, Perhaps?. From AP: A little over two years ago, Jorge De La Rosa gave up Alex Rodriguez's 400th career home run. Guess who'll be on the mound for Kansas City on Thursday night, when A-Rod tries to become the youngest member of the 500-homer club? "It's a crazy thing," Rodriguez said after hitting No. 499 off Gil Meche in the eighth inning of Wednesday night's 7-1 victory over the Royals. "It's pretty unbelievable that it could actually work out that way." Hey, Yankees now 6 1/2 games back of Red Sox. Is it a race yet?*

• Web Gems. Brandon Webb and his fastball are as one, like the beaver and the dam (what?). I'm trying trying to say that he threw seven shutout innings for his first win since June, the Diamondbacks beating the Marlins 7-0; Arizona's fifth straight win.

• The Unstoppable Force That Is The Chicago Cubs. The Cardinals' Adam Wainwright struck out six of his first 10 batters, but it was the Cubs' Ted Lilly who got the win, Chicago prevailing 7-1. The Cubs are two games behind the first-place Brewers in the NL Central.

* (not yet).