Jeff Bailey … yes, Jeff Bailey … helped the Red Sox jump out to a 3-0 lead, hitting his fourth career home run over the left field wall on a 1-0 Francisco Liriano change-up. Bailey had hit four home runs, while carrying a .255 batting average. (That would be 25 percent of hits going for homers).

Liriano has come away with four strikeouts — including the unbelievably hot-hitting Kevin Youkilis (his ninth punch-out of the season), but he did walk J.D. Drew, who has yet to have an at-bat today without getting on base. Youkilis would make up for hit by robbing Nick Punto of a third-inning hit down the third-base line.

When Liriano first came up in 2005 he had an outrageous 12.5 strikeouts per nine innings pitched. After batting elbow issues, it appears as though the 25-year-old might be returning to form, coming into Wednesday with a 9.6 K/9 clip.

Red Sox 3, Twins 0

It has been well documented how Brad Penny’s two Fenway Park starts have not gone swimmingly, giving up 17 runs. But it should also be noted that the first inning has also proved to be somewhat of a bugaboo throughout his career, having given up more home runs (30) in the frame than any other frame.

Game started at 7:57 with the temperature standing at 49 degrees.

Penny made it through the first in fine fashion (excluding a walk to Justin Morneau), throwing first-pitch strikes to each of the four batters he faced while tossing 10 of his first 16 offerings for strikes. He threw just two curveballs, with his fastball topping out at 93 mph.

Dustin Pedroia’s swing and miss at a third strike against Minnesota Francisco Liriano was just his 11th swing and miss of the season. Pedroia led the Red Sox in fewest swings and misses (8.1 percent) last season, with Jacoby Ellsbury finishing second at 12.6 percent. This year it’s Ellsbury who is the early lead, coming in at 8.0 percent, while Mike Lowell is second, missing eight of his 85 swings (9.4 percent)

Red Sox 0, Twins 0

It looks as though the Red Sox and Twins are going to attempt to play the second game of their doubleheader Wednesday after all, with the scheduled start time slated for 7:55 p.m.

If you’re looking to pass the time, check out the 10 questions asked of Nick Green by intern Drew Scott after the Red Sox’ Game 1 win.

With the 7-inning, rain-shortened complete game victory over the Twins, Tim Wakefield became the oldest pitcher since Charlie Hough to hurl back to back complete game victories. Hough did it June 17 and 22 in 1992 while pitching for the White Sox. Wakefield, who was coming off a complete game victory  against Oakland, is the oldest Sox pitcher to turn in a complete game (42 years, 263 days).

Wakefield now owns 32 complete games and has collected back to back complete games on six occasions. He has compiled a 1.69 ERA (3 ER/16 IP) over the past two games, giving up nine hits while fanning eight and walking three.

Mike Lowell is getting his first day off the season after starting the first 14 games, with Kevin Youkilis moving over to third base and Jeff Bailey starting at first in tonight’s Game 2, which is supposed to pit Brad Penny against Minnesota’s Francisco Liriano. While the weather is putting the 7:10 p.m. starting time iffy, the Sox are ready to wear uniforms with green trim along with green hats in honor of Earth Day.

The first game of the day-night doubleheader was just called, with the Red Sox declared the 10-1 winners. The night game is still scheduled to start on time. That’s unique…

The rain keeps coming, with no indication about when or whether play will resume. New media relations staffer Leah Tobin is in her first week working with the Red Sox after working for the Astros and Padres in recent seasons. The change of working environment has been palpable: in those jobs, she never had a rainout, and endured only one rain delay at her home field thanks to the retractable roof in Houston and the perfect weather in San Diego. In Boston, Tobin has now faced a rainout and delay on consecutive days.

Anyhoo, with no game in progress, here’s hoping that those of you who are getting antsy for baseball can take solace in the following — a list of 20 things you might not have known about the Red Sox. In no particular order (these will be posted about five at a time…keep checking back!):

1) Jason Varitek went 2-for-5 with a homer on Monday. As our man Gary From Chapel Hill informs us, the Red Sox have won the last 17 games when he has collected at least two hits for them, dating to last May.

2) The fact that Manny Delcarmen has logged 8.1 scoreless innings this year has been well documented. But his regular-season dominance stretches back further than that. He has thrown 19.2 scoreless innings over 14 appearances dating to last Sept. 9. (He did, however, endure quite a blemish on that run of excellence in the form of a seven-run yield in just two innings against the Rays in the ALCS.)

3) We mentioned in the Five Things We Learned on Saturday that Hideki Okajima has an obscene 0.36 ERA when pitching on zero days of rest. Gary From Chapel Hill went into his Land of Magical Numbers to discover that he has the lowest such mark since the stat started being chronicled. Also on the list? Pedro Martinez, based on his work as a reliever for the Dodgers in 1993.

4) Kevin Youkilis deserves his title of on-base machine. He’s reached safely in each of the Sox’ first 14 games this year. He’s still got a ways to go before he catches up with his before-his-time soulmate in the mechanics of reaching base, Wade Boggs. Boggs started the 1983 season by reaching safely in 27 straight games.

5) Nick Green is making his ninth start of the year at shortstop. It is his most career starts at the position in any single season. As we mentioned in today’s Five Things, Green has a good chance of becoming the 10th player to spend 25 or more games at short since the start of the 2004 season. Who are the other nine? Click here for the answer.

6) George Kottaras recorded his first big-league RBI today in his eighth career game. He joines teammates Dustin Pedroia and Jason Varitek as Red Sox players who have started their careers with seven games without an RBI. Haywood Sullivan owns the Red Sox record for the longest start to a career without driving in a run, having gone 19 games without doing so after he debuted.

7) Reserve first baseman / outfielder Chris Carter believes that most rainouts are unnecessary concessions to the weather. While playing with Triple-A Tucson in the Arizona system, he claims to have endured monsoons on an annual basis. Don’t believe that Arizona endures monsoons? Think again!

8) Julio Lugo played in his first rehab game for Triple-A Pawtucket, going 0-for-3 with a walk. Lugo played eight innings. His rehab outing was less impressive than that of Jonathan Van Every, who in his first game since spraining an ankle in early March hit a grand slam with two outs in the ninth inning to tie the game for the PawSox. Pawtucket went on to win, 8-7, in 11 innings.

9) It’s Terry Francona‘s 50th birthday. He’s 3-4 in career games on his birthday. Whoops: make that 4-4: the game was just called.

Tim Wakefield is the ever-underappreciated glue of the Red Sox pitching staff. Perhaps because he does not light up a radar gun, insufficient value is conferred upon his predictable ability to log innings.

Sox pitching coach John Farrell goes out of his way to identify what Wakefield has meant to the club over recent years. Since the start of the 2007 season, he ranks in the top three on the club in wins, innings and starts. The man takes the ball, and delivers in a major-league average or slightly above average fashion. There’s value to that.

There are moments, of course, where those talents — durability and, despite the unpredictable nature of his pitch, relatively predictable performance — are more widely appreciated. Wakefield’s two most recent starts — last Wednesday in Oakland, when his bullpen was running on fumes thanks to a one-inning start from Daisuke Matsuzaka the previous day, and today in the first half of a doubleheader — are such a time.

He gave up a one-out double to deep right-center to Denard Span. Once again, Wakefield was undeterred while pitching with a man in scoring position, getting infield pop-outs from Alexi Casilla and Justin Morneau. He has now stranded eight runners on the afternoon.

The rain has arrived in Fenway, as has the seventh-inning stretch. Over his last two starts, Wakefield has turned in 16 innings and allowed three runs. It will be one of the best combined two-game lines of any Red Sox starter this year.

BOTTOM 7: RED SOX 6, TWINS 1

David Ortiz is clearly looking to right his form by attacking the opposite field. With reliever Juan Morillo on to start the seventh, Ortiz played Wall Ball, lofting a ball high off the Green Monster in left-center. In better weather, the ball would have been deposited in the stands for Ortiz’ first homer of the year. Instead, the Sox D.H. had to settle for a double, his fourth extra-base hit of the year.

Kevin Youkilis followed Ortiz by walking. Youkilis has now walked 10 times this year, compared to six by Ortiz. Ortiz, in fact, is now in his sixth straight game without getting walked, either a sign that opponents are unafraid to challenge him or that they do not want runners on base in front of Youkilis or, more likely, both.

Morillo is struggling to find the strike zone, raising the possibility of a novel event: R.A. Dickey is loosening in the Twins bullpen, presenting a chance that two knuckleballers could be in the game at the same time.

Morillo walked J.D. Drew, who is delivering quality at-bats every time he steps to the plate, to load the bases for Jason Bay. The right-hander then walked Bay on four pitches to force in a run.

“I like walking,” Bay said before today’s game.

That’s a good thing, since he now has an A.L.-leading 16 walks in 14 games this year. This from Gary From Chapel Hill:

The Sox got their 1st bases loaded walk of 2009 after receiving 17 in 2008, 4th most in the majors:

25 – Tampa Bay
21 – Oakland
20 – Chi Cubs
17 – Boston

It was the 3rd “RBI-walk” allowed by the Twins this season already after they allowed only 4 such walks during all of last season.  The Orioles led the league last season, allowing 30.

And…yes! Thanks to that free run, Morillo has been yanked in favor of R.A. Dickey! I’m guessing that Ron Gardenhire could become the next Davey Johnson, appearing in a “How do you spell relief? R-O-L-A-I-D-S” commercial on a day when he brings in a knuckleballer with the bases loaded.

Upon entering, Dickey promptly gave up a run-scoring single to left by Mike Lowell. Did we mention that the Sox are getting some good productivity from their seventh hole this year? (16 RBI and counting.) It’s a bit surprising to see no pinch-runner for Lowell — one might expect the team to rest his achy hip.

George Kottaras lifted a sacrifice fly to left for the inning’s first out. Also noteworthy: it was the first career RBI for Kottaras… unless, of course, rain wipes out this inning of play. Which it might.

Following Kottaras, Nick Green blooped a ground-rule double down the left-field line to expand the lead to 10-1. But as the runners navigated the bases, the field was evidently turning to slop, and so umpires suspended play. RAIN DELAY STARTS AT 2:46PM!

A debate is currently churning about whether, if the duration of the game is rained out, the score would be 10-1 or if it would revert to the last completed inning of play, meaning that the game would end in a 6-1 Red Sox victory.

Here’s what’s at stake: if the seventh inning doesn’t count, Kottaras loses his first career run batted in.

Nick Green would be denied his fifth career game with three or more RBIs (and first since 2005).

Juan Morillo’s dignity would be restored, as his line of 0 innings, four runs, one hit and three walks would be expunged.

And, of course, a game that featured two knuckleballers would suddenly be revised so that only one took his turn.

Drama abounds! Or, at the least, one must needs pretend that it does to salvage some intrigue for what could be a verrrrry long rain delay. For those looking for a way to pass the time, might we encourage you to visit the Rainout Blog?

RAIN DELAY: RED SOX 10, TWINS 1. MAYBE.

UPDATE: THE RUNS, AND STATS, COUNT. NICK GREEN AND GEORGE KOTTARAS CAN BREATHE MORE EASILY. JUAN MORILLO WEEPS.