"His manager, predictably, ridiculed Dustin Pedroia for landing on the cover of the newest issue of Sports Illustrated, expected to hit newsstands today.

"Sports Illustrated for animals?" Terry Francona asked before last night's game against the Twins. "Maybe that will loosen him up a little bit."

The cover features Pedroia suspended in midair while turning a double play over a hard slide by the Yankees' Eduardo Nunez last weekend at Fenway Park. The headline reads "Heart of the Red Sox, Dustin Pedroia."

The Sox second baseman, who after a slow start has played himself into the AL MVP discussion, downplayed the whole thing.

Still, he admitted that being chosen as the cover boy was somewhat of a thrill.

"It's pretty cool. It's exciting," Pedroia said. "There's a ton of athletes in the world, so I guess it's pretty cool. I'm definitely probably going to get one of them blown up. That will be cool."

He demurred about being the only "heart" on the team.

"There's a lot of guys on this team. Pretty much everybody, we play this game the right way," Pedroia said. "So it's great that that's the headline, but everyone on our team, we count on each other to win games. It's not just one guy, it's 25 guys. That's how I think of things."

Pedroia acted as if he never had heard of the Sports Illustrated jinx, which pretty much guarantees doom and destruction for any team, creature or individual who lands on the cover."