What Great Pitching Looks Like

The rain may have picked up the W on Friday night, but the Sox gobbled up the Rays in a whirlwhind 3-game sweep with three outstanding performances by Sox starters against a team that had the Sox' number for most of the season. Now said team appears to be in a free-fall after the trade of Scott Kazmir and the injury to Carlos Pena. Sox pitching held the Rays to a mere two runs over the entire series (one game was cut short by rain, but still...). Saturday night, Beckett spun 5 1/3 innings of one-run ball while the Sox teed off on Rays rookie Wade Davis and assorted relievers. He threw only 5 1/3 because that's all the game they got in before the tarp was rolled out and the game was eventually called.

High noon today, Clay Buchholz took the mound and promptly engaged in a pitching duel with Sox nemesis Matt "Gargamel" Garza. The hometown team struck first with an RBI double by V-Mart, scoring Pedey, who also doubled. The Rays tied it in the top of the 7th and almost plated the go-ahead run, but Gabe Gross was nailed at the plate by V-Mart. Since Buch left the game after the inning and the score was still tied when Oki took the mound in the 8th, he did not pick up the W, but I'm sure he's happy with his performance and with the team's win. Oki, who had been scuffling lately, returned to form by retiring the side in order. Then, in the bottom of the 8th, Papi stroked a pinch-hit double in the place of Nick Green and Pedey took Garza deep to make the score 3-1. Pap sealed the deal and the Sox clinched a series win.

Game two had Lester on the hill and he was lights-out, pitching 8 shutout innings of 2-hit ball. Unfortunately, due to blackout restrictions where I live, I couldn't see the game on TV and had to settle for following it online. Not. The. Same. The runs were scored on an RBI groundout by Lowell, a 2-RBI single by Tek and a Bay dinger (#32 on the season). Despite the crazy weather and all the waiting through rain delays, the Sox had a victorious weekend and kept the pressure on the Rangers, gaining at least a game on their Wild Card lead.

I like seeing the Red Sox play some small ball to manufacture runs. When up against tough pitchers like Garza and Shields, playing for the big inning isn't always the best way to go. With Gonzo coming from the NL and having experience laying down sac bunts, the Sox add more dimension to their offensive attack and that can only help as they fight for a spot in the playoffs.

The Sox get a well-deserved break tomorrow, their last off-day of the season, and then here come the Angels. Tuesday will be very interesting, with Dice-K making his first start in nearly three months. If he can even give us 5-6 innings of quality pitching (3 runs or less), that would be a big boost for the team. Right now, Beckett, Lester, and Buchholz look like as good of a 1-2-3 as any team has. If Matsuzaka can pitch well enough to be a solid #4, it will take some pressure off of Wake, who has to pitch through pain that severely limits his ability to field his position.

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!

September Sox Musings

Where do the Red Sox stand now, with three weeks and change? The Sox have a two-game lead over those feisty Texas Rangers in the Wild Card race. Seven series remain to be played, starting with the dare-we-say-they're-fading Tampa Bay Rays, who come to Fenway tomorrow. The Rays are without their slugging first baseman Carlos Pena, whose fingers were broken by a C.C. Sabathia pitch over the weekend, and they've fallen nine and a half games behind the Red Sox. The Sox recently defeated them in their home dome (or is it "dome home"?). Does this mean the Rays are cooked for the season or will those reigning AL Champs come to The Fens seeking revenge? Despite the Rays' woebegone late-season state, the Sox can't afford to take these guys lightly. After all, there's still the superhuman-against-the-Red Sox Evan Longoria to consider. The Sox send their current best three to the mound in Lester, Beckett and Buchholz, so I like their chances, even if they do have to face Gargamel--I mean Garza on Sunday.

After the Rays pack it up and leave Beantown, in come the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. This will be a toughie because these guys have a helluva road record and they wreak havoc on the basepaths. Since the top three starters are being used in the Rays series, that leaves the "pray for rain" end of the rotation to face a lineup stacked with .300 hitters who are well-schooled in the art of small ball. I'm getting a truly frightening image of a hobbled Wake, who has always had trouble with the Halos, trying to field bunts with a badly balking back. That's not a team he needs to be facing in his condition and let's hope they hold him until after that series. The image of Byrd, Bowden, or Tazawa facing Scioscia's men isn't much prettier. There's a possibility of one Daisuke Matsuzaka returning to the mound for this series with the Angels. He pitched well in his final rehab start, albeit against single-A competition. At this point, how much worse could he be than the other options? With the off-day on Monday, the Sox can start Lester as early as next Wednesday and then Beckett on Thursday, both on regular rest.

A ten-game road trip follows the Angels series--the last road trip of the regular season. First stop: Baltimore, to kick around the O's some more. Then, off to Kansas City for fun with the Royals. The trip culminates in a Sox-Yankees series in New York. Tum-ta-tum-tum TUMS!

Coming back home to finish out the season will feel like the last week of school, with a jaunt with the Jays and a tangle with the Tribe. So the Sox will be playing in October, that's for sure. The bigger question this year is: will they be playing in November? Game 4 of the World Series is to be played November 1, so baseball will be played in the eleventh month. Do I think they'll make the playoffs? They have a very good chance, but they'll need to hold off those Rangers in the last weeks of the season to get it done. The best way to do that is by winning games, rather than just hoping Texas loses.


LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!

Now Playing The Role of Evan Longoria: Mark Kotsay

So, can I call him a Sox killer when what he did this weekend helped the OTHER team with "Sox" in their name? Probably not, but he sure got his revenge on the Red Sox for DFA-ing him. I'm typing this a few hours after the Red Sox got bested by the White Sox at The Cell, only winning one game in a 4-game series. The game they won was the one Lester pitched. Lester, who pitched six scoreless innings yesterday and racked up 8 Ks, now has over 200 Ks on the season. 204, to be exact. Nice work, Jon!

For the first game of the series, it was "shame on the pitching". Byrd got buried by the White Sox bats and long-reliever Tazawa didn't fare much better. White Sox set the tone for the series, embarrassing the Red Sox in a 12-2 blowout. For games 2 and 4, it was "shame on the offense". One run apiece in those two games, folks! Gavin Floyd might have brought his best stuff to game 2, but did the Red Sox have to be the team to give today's starter Mark Buehrle his first win since his July 23 perfect game? Beckett gave them a quality start (3 runs over 7 innings and no long balls!), but couldn't get help from the guys wielding the sticks.

Why, oh why isn't Tek batting 9th on the days where V-Mart needs a break behind the plate? Gonzo's hitting better than him (who isn't?) and he deserves to bat before Tek. Glad to see Lowell get the nod at DH today. He should DH more often, especially when Tek is in the lineup. Papi's been very streaky this year and now his bat's back in the deep-freeze. Lowell, on the other hand, has been consistent for the most part. Shouldn't such consistency be rewarded with more playing time? Just sayin'...

After a mixed-bag of a road trip that brought long-awaited triumph at the Trop, but abject disappointment in The Windy City, the Sox head home to the Fens for 8 games. The first two are against the O's (who will be lucky not to see Lester on that mound) and then the Rays and Angels. The Rays, I'm sure, will not back down even as their wild card chances slip away and the Angels own the Red Sox in the regular season, so home might not be quite so sweet this time around. Then again, this is baseball and anything can happen.

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!

As Refreshing As a Glass of...

...Tropicana Orange Juice! After almost two years (and one team's name change) the Red Sox have won a series at Tropicana Field! Young Buch helped guide his team to last night's victory, further strengthening his campaign for the #3 spot in the rotation. He was a little shaky in the early going, but kept the damage to a minimum. He got better as the game went on, retiring the last nine batters he faced. His line: 6 IP, 6 H, 3 ER 1 BB 3K Wagner, Bard, and Pap kept the door shut tight while the Sox added to the 4-3 lead they had when Buchholz left the game. Bay, Youk, V-Mart, Lowell, and Baldelli lead the offensive attack. The former Ray Rocco crushed one into the left field seats to break what was at the time a 2-2 tie in the 2nd inning. Bay got the Sox on the board with a 2-RBI double the inning before. Lowell's sac fly in the 6th put the Sox ahead of the Rays for good; Youk and V-Mart added insurance in the 7th.

I'm so proud of my Red Sox for playing their best ball and taking their stand against the Rays in a place where they've found it hard to succeed in the past two years. Buchholz deserves special props for stepping up and throwing a quality start in a crucial, playoff-atmosphere game against a division rival. The Sox are now 6 games up on the Rays in the wild card chase. The Yanks have it super-easy lately, playing the Jays and the O's, so catching up to them for the division, while not mathematically impossible, will require some massive implosion on the part of the pinstripe posse. But, it's all about getting INTO the playoffs, right? Get in, whether it be the front door or the back, and anything's possible. Just ask the 2004 team.

It's a battle of the laundry this weekend: Red Sox vs. White Sox at The Cell. Wake's due to pitch tomorrow afternoon and I hope V-Mart is behind the plate. He did just fine catching Wake's last start and at this point in the season, the Red Sox really need his bat to stay in the lineup. Tonight, Byrd's on the hill, trying to go 2 for 2 in as many starts. The battle of Sox supremacy continues...

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!

This Longoria thing is getting REALLY old!

Seriously, can the Red Sox have at least ONE series where Evan Longoria doesn't hit a home run off of them? He looks like freakin' Babe Ruth against the Sox. Chew on these stats: 8 HR and 26 RBI against the Red Sox this season with a .362 BA and 1.280 OPS! Sure, he's in the same division and faces the Sox a lot, but let's look at his stats against the rest of the AL East:

Yanks: 4 HR 9 RBI .250 BA .990 OPS
O's: 4 HR 10 RBI, .326 BA 1.100 OPS
Jays: O HR 7 RBI, .246 BA .634 OPS

He does some damage against the O's and even the Yanks, but the Jays, interestingly enough, have a way of keeping his bat quiet. He may be just one player, but he's a Sox-killer if I've ever seen one. For a kid who's, like, 24 with less than two years of major league experience under his belt, that's some serious ownage of one team. It doesn't help that he shares a last name with a Desperate Housewife...

Tonight it's up to Young Buch to step up and pretend the Rays are the Jays. In other words, get a WIN for the Sox at the Trop. Is that too much to ask? Winning a series in St. Pete?? If the Sox are a playoff-caliber team, it shouldn't be. The batters have to stop swinging at bad pitches and the skipper has to make the tough decisions necessary to give the team the best chance of winning. That means V-Mart behind the plate and Lowell at third. It means putting the best relievers in if the game is close or if the team is behind, but within reach. It means pulling struggling pitchers BEFORE things get out of hand. Shoot, Maddon pulls a reliever when he looks at him funny!

LET'S GO RED SOX! BEAT THOSE BLEEPIN' RAYS!!!!

Long Time, No See...

...A walkoff blast from Big Papi, that is! It's been almost two years, the last one coming in September of '07. Tonight, in a game that marked Wake's return to the rotation, and a very strong return at that, Papi broke a 2-all tie in the bottom of the ninth by taking a Tony Pena pitch high and deep into the right field seats. In the commercial break before that half-inning began, I was just thinking to myself how cool it would be if, for old time's sake, Papi did the walkoff thing he did time after time several years ago. Not that I'm taking credit for any ESP (Extra Sports Perception *wink*), but it sure was nice to watch my pseudo-prediction come true and see the team gather at the mound to greet the once and future Red Sox Nation hero. The patented Papi walkoff magic was actually his second long ball of the night. The first one came in the second inning, tying the game at one.

Wake and V-Mart, the other big story of the game: Wake went 7 innings, allowing 1 run, walking 1, and fanning 3. V-Mart, who had never caught a knuckler in a game situation before, did a fabulous job, with the only ball eluding his glove coming in the first inning with no-one on base. He embraced the challenge of catching the most unpredictable pitch known to man and came out on top. It's great to see Wake have such a strong outing after over a month on the DL; it's as if he never left. If he can keep it up, with V-Mart behind the plate, that's great news for the Red Sox.

Tomorrow they go for the sweep of those other Sox with Junichi Tazawa on the hill. Last time we saw Tazawa, he was blanking the Yanks over six innings. Dare we hope for a similar outing against the White Sox?

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!

The One Where The Rookie Outpitches The Ace

It's about time to take a Missing Persons ad out for Commander Kick-Ass. The Imposter was on the mound again last night and he was baking some delicious cookies for the Yanks, tossing them out over the plate through eight innings as if to say "Snack time, boys!" The only thing missing was the milk.

Sabathia, on the other hand, wasn't lights out either, but he didn't have to be while his teammates were gobbling up the cookies and sending them flying out of the park. The only bright spot in that game was my mute button, so I didn't have to listen to the Yankee rah-rah spewing out of the mouths of Miller and Morgan.

Saturday's game was far more pleasant to watch, with the Sox hammering A.J. Burnett & Co. to the tune of 14 runs while Japanese rookie Junichi Tazawa spins 6 scoreless frames, escaping jams in a way his hero Dice-K would be proud of (while being a little less maddening to watch in the process). His dazzling performance bumped rapidly-declining Brad, the author of Friday night's debacle, to the bullpenny with Wake taking his spot in the rotation on Wednesday.

Tazawa's start was encouraging, especially after last Sunday's loss in Texas. Buchholz, who has put together a string of encouraging starts himself, toes the rubber tonight against favorite Red Sox pinata Jose Contreras. Sox-on-Sox action this week. May the best (*Red*) Sox win!

LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!