BOSTON — Baseball America magazine will be coming out with its annual “Best Tools” edition, scheduled to hit the newsstands on Aug. 13.

The publication surveys managers on various skills in the game. The Red Sox’ Josh Beckett was voted as having the best curveball.

The right-hander used it to great effect early last night, even against left-handed hitters, where the ball would be breaking into them.

Beckett totally fooled the Orioles’ Nick Markakis with a 1-and-2 curveball in the first inning, freezing the left-handed hitter him for a strikeout. In the second inning, he buckled the knees of right-handed-hitting Ramon Hernandez for another called third strike.

The curveball also set up a whiff of Aubrey Huff, a left-handed hitter. Beckett dropped one in beautifully, running the count to 0-and-2, and then he whipped a fastball over the inside corner that caught Huff looking at strike three.

And when he was in a jam in the third, Beckett went to the curveball for a key strikeout. With runners on second and third and one out and the Birds already ahead, 2-0, Beckett threw a 3-and-2 curveball to Markakis. The Orioles right fielder clearly was expecting a fastball.

He was well out on his front foot as the 79-mph breaking ball arrived, down and over the plate. Markakis waved at the pitch and missed it.

Maybe Beckett should have used his breaking ball on Kevin Millar, too. Millar, batting after Markakis in the third, grounded a fastball up the middle for a two-run single that made it a 4-0 game.

Beckett finished the night with six strikeouts, four of them on curveballs, including a whiff of Jay Gibbons with runners at second and third and one out in the sixth, defusing a Baltimore rally.

Unfortunately for Beckett, though, he threw a few too many hittable fastballs, resulting in his giving up five runs in eight innings.

Pena caught daydreaming

Wily Mo Pena, whose name kept coming up in trade-deadline rumors, was in the starting lineup in right field last night in a bit of unofficial platooning with high-priced J.D. Drew.

Maybe Pena’s mind still was on the trade that didn’t happen. Maybe he was hoping he’d be sent to some team that would allow him more playing time than he is getting in Boston.

It sure looked as if he were daydreaming on Beckett’s first pitch of the game, which Baltimore’s Dave Roberts lofted deep into the right-field corner.

Pena did not give an all-out chase after the ball. He sauntered, seemingly convinced it was long gone.

The ball, though, hit off the top of the low wall. It bounced into the seats for a homer. Had Pena raced back to the wall, he may have had a shot at keeping the Orioles from taking a 1-0 lead on the first pitch of the game.

The defensively challenged Pena didn’t do Beckett or the Sox any favors in the third, either. He didn’t get a great jump on Jay Payton’s one-out looper, so the ball fell a few feet in front of Pena’s feet. The single ignited a three-run rally.

Pena was more awake in the fourth, making an ugly but effective lunging, diving catch of Ramon Hernandez’s sinking liner.

That’s more like it

Baltimore center fielder Corey Patterson went racing across the turf that had been torn up by The Police concert during their performance last week and robbed Julio Lugo of a hit with a diving catch in the first.

In the eighth, Markakis, the Orioles’ right fielder, showed Pena how to go after a ball. He raced into foul territory, launched himself almost two rows into the seats and snagged Manny Ramirez’s fly ball.

A wake-up call

There was a little bit of live-and-learn for Beckett when it came to Orioles baserunners at second base.

In the third, Beckett paid little attention to Roberts, who got a great jump and stole third base without a throw. It was Roberts’ 32nd stolen base of the year.

In the fifth., Patterson, who had 25 stolen bases, was at second (with Markakis at first) with two outs. This time Beckett looked back, forcing Patterson to retreat a step or so. When Beckett turned his head back toward the plate, Patterson jumped back out a step or so, seemingly poised to run.

But second baseman Dustin Pedroia, seeing that action, whistled to Beckett, who again looked back to the bag, again forcing Patterson to retreat a step or so.

Patterson, though, was intent on trying to swipe third, so when Beckett looked back to the plate and delivered a pitch, the Baltimore center fielder took off for third. But because Beckett had held him close and forced him back, Patterson was a dead duck at third. The throw from catcher Jason Varitek to Mike Lowell had Patterson out by a good five feet.

skrasner@projo.com