August 5, 2003 ... It was offense, offense, and more offense, that carried the Olde Towne Team, bailing the Sox out of an early 5-0 deficit and carrying them to a 10-9 victory over the Anaheim Angels before another sellout crowd of 34,678 at Fenway.  Three-run homers by Nomar Garciaparra and Kevin Millar shook the Sox out of their doldrums, and eventually it was Trot Nixon's seventh-inning single off ace reliever Brendan Donnelly that broke a 9-9 deadlock and provided win No. 65 here in the season of the Offensive Mosh Pit.

The victory, their second in a row after dropping four straight across Texas and Baltimore, kept the Sox 3 1/2 games behind the Yankees in the AL East and a half-game ahead of the A's in the wild- card race. They have 51 games to go, slightly more than seven weeks to keep those hitting shoes laced securely to their feet

Jeff Suppan, after allowing only 11 homers in the 141 innings he pitched for Pittsburgh this season, allowed three on the night, and two of them (Scott Spiezio and Adam Kennedy) came in his first 1 1/ 3 innings. By the end of 4 1/2 innings, the clubs were locked in a 7-7 tie, and both starting pitchers, Suppan and John Lackey, were still in the game. In the end, neither was credited with a decision. Lackey, in fact, didn't exit until the Sox posted two more runs in the bottom of the fifth for what was a temporary 9-7 lead.

Nixon's winning hit came off of Donnelly, the AL's Mr. Untouchable out of the bullpen this season. He had an 0.38 earned run average at the All-Star break and the run he allowed last night ballooned that to 0.82. Not great enough, however, to step into the middle of a Back Bay minefield and shut down the Sox in the seventh. Manny Ramirez led with a walk, moved to second on a David Ortiz roll out, and came across when Nixon punched a 1-and-1 pitch to left-center with two outs.

You expect it especially when your team is in control of a 5-0 lead after 2 1/2 innings. The Angels picked on Suppan for a pair of runs in the second on the Spiezio and Kennedy solo shots. They added three more in the third, cobbled together with three singles, a hit batter, and a sacrifice fly.

But the Sox erupted for seven against Lackey in their half of the third, six coming across after two outs. Garciaparra hammered his three-run homer into the Monster seats, trimming the deficit to 5- 4, and only three hitters later, Millar sent a mammoth shot over the Sports Authority billboard that backs the last row of the Monster seats. Millar crossed the plate with the 7-5 lead just about the same time his home run ricocheted off the front door of a Main Street barber shop in Lewiston, Maine.

Still, they weren't enough, because the Angels kept chipping away at Suppan (7 runs) and Todd Jones (2 runs), all of it leading to the Nixon-Donnelly confrontation in the seventh. It ended with Nixon posting his 68th RBI of the year, and no one moving an inch in the respective races in the East or the wild card. Suppan was long gone by the time Ramirez boogied across with the winning touch at home.

Jeff Suppan made 103 pitches, 62 for strikes, in his five innings of work. The crowd of 34,678 was the 31st Fenway sellout this season, the 21st in a row. The teams banged out 11 hits apiece, but no one had more than two hits. Kim put together a 1-2-3 inning for his eighth save.

Jeremy Giambi, fast becoming Boston's designated sitter, returned to the disabled list yesterday, opening up a roster spot that the Red Sox filled by claiming first baseman Dave McCarty via waivers from Oakland. McCarty, 33, made it to the park in time to pull on his Boston-issue shirt (No. 10), and Grady Little used him in the ninth inning as a defensive replacement at first base. He was briefly handcuffed by a Garret Anderson hot shot but recovered the ball in time to make the play to an alert Byung Hyun Kim covering first base.

The appearances of Suppan and McCarty increased to 42 the number of players the Sox have suited up this season. Nearly two-thirds of those players, 27, were not with the Sox at the end of last season. Suppan became the 25th pitcher the Sox have used this season, one shy of the club record set in 1995