What's new? Success

At some point, the comparisons will end. At some point, Josh Beckett will become known only for this year, sloughing off his first campaign with the Red Sox as an aberration, leaving behind the pitches flying out of the park, the overreliance on his fastball, the legacy as a question mark in the trade with the Marlins that cost Boston Hanley Ramirez and Anibal Sanchez, taking instead his position as the ace.

That point -- six starts, six wins, and a 2.72 ERA into his second season with the Sox -- has not yet come. But if he continues to pitch as he has, using sheer stuff, a bit of maturity, and a dash of Jason Varitek (to whom he gave credit for calling the game in the interview room afterward), it will arrive.

Still, the first reaction, even after he stuffed the A's, 6-4, last night to become the first Red Sox pitcher since Roger Clemens in 1991 to win his first six starts, was tinged with the past.

"He's a pitcher," Alex Cora said. "He's a complete pitcher. It's night and day from last year."

Yet that's really one of the only things that's different.

Beckett himself has not become any different, at least not overtly. He appears the same on the mound, though far less frustrated, and far less prone to having to watch balls soar behind him. He appears the same in the postgame interview room, where he has always been better and more analytical after a loss. In many ways, he's still the same understated player; his only comment on duplicating Clemens's achievement was that it was "nice."

Though the confidence in and strength of his secondary pitches (especially his curveball and changeup) have become the biggest reasons for the turnaround, Beckett became the majors' first six-game winner, on his way to reestablishing his name as one that inspires fear, because of his ever-dangerous fastball.

"His other pitches have become more effective," Varitek said after Beckett's three-run, six-hit, two-walk, seven-strikeout performance. "But it's still, even with that, the location of his fastball is still key."

As it was last night.

"I was getting a lot of ground balls," Beckett said of an outing in which his fastball hovered around 95 miles per hour and his curveball in the upper 70s. "That's always good. Whenever they're hitting one of the first three pitches, you know you're not going to get into a pitch-count problem and get into the bullpen after the fifth inning. That feels good, knowing you're getting those mishit balls, people hitting balls off the end of the bat, getting jammed and stuff."

His location, paired with a nasty curveball, kept the A's off the base paths for four innings, through which Beckett was perfect, with three strikeouts and only 37 pitches. But over the next two innings, he allowed three runs and was removed after the seventh, despite having thrown just 103 pitches, because his back was beginning to stiffen. Manager Terry Francona said Beckett's spike had become caught at one point, though the pitcher said he did not feel the effects until the seventh.

"I thought he had more in him," Francona said. "But when he starts saying he's stiff, that's time to get him out of there."

Not that there should be any worry. Francona and Beckett made assurances that it would not be a problem.

Before Beckett was lifted in favor of Hideki Okajima, he showed impressive stuff in emerging unscathed from a small jam in the seventh. After retiring the first two batters, he walked Ryan Langerhans -- who managed not a single hit with the A's before getting traded for the second time in a week after the game -- and Shannon Stewart to put two on with two out. But he found something, even with the stiffening back, that allowed him to get up to 97 m.p.h. on the fastball that retired Mark Ellis (looking) and himself.

Yet, even with the numbers beginning to pile up -- six wins by the first week of May -- there was no mistaking that Beckett wasn't quite as dominating as he has been in other performances. Oakland had chances. Beckett just didn't give up that home run, the one he would have last year, the one that would have allowed the sluggish A's back into the game. Not that anyone's complaining, exactly.

"It was still a quality start," Varitek said. "But it wasn't the best he's been."

Amalie Benjamin can be reached at abenjamin@globe.com.