Despite the wildness of Daisuke Matsuzaka tonight, the Boston Red Sox used 3 home runs to beat the flailing Detroit Tigers 6-3 in front of 39,478 fans at Comerica Park. The win for the Red Sox is their 4th straight while the Tigers fall for the 4th straight time as well.

To say Dice-K had no command tonight would be an understatement. He issued 8 walks, his career high, in just 5 innings of work, throwing 109 pitches in the process. Shockingly, even with all those walks, he only gave up 1 run on 2 hits. He had the only strikeout of the night from the Red Sox pitchers. Normally, if you walk 8 guys, you’re down 5 or 6-0. There wasn’t an inning where he didn’t walk a batter.

Mike Lowell, Kevin Youkilis and David Ortiz led the charge offensively as they all had a home run and 2 RBI’s. Both Lowell (3-for-5) and Youk had 2-run homers while Big Papi’s (2-for-4) was a solo shot. Big Papi’s average now stands at a robust .225. J.D. Drew added 2 hits for the Sox.

Manny Ramirez led off the 2nd with a double to deep center off of Tigers starter Jeremy Bonderman. Lowell took a fastball from Bonderman and put it in the left fields seat for a 2-run homer, his first home run and RBI(s) of the season.

The first two walks issued by Dice-K came in the top half of the 1st inning. He walked another in the 2nd inning and two more in the 3rd inning.

It was an almost perfect carbon copy of the 2nd inning in the 4th for the Red Sox. Lowell led off with a double and came around to score when Youk smacked his 4th homer of the season.

Despite all those walks in the first 3 innings, Dice-K still hadn’t allowed a hit. That all changed in the 4th inning when the walks came back to haunt him.

He walked Tigers slugger Gary Sheffield to start the inning. He then got pop ups from Matt Joyce and Edgar Renteria before walking Ivan Rodriguez. Curtis Granderson broke up the no-no with a single that scored Sheffield from second to cut the Red Sox lead to 4-1. He got Placido Polanco to pop out for the third out.

In the bottom of the 5th, Dice-K issued his 8th walk of the the night after Miguel Cabrera singled. His last pitch of the night was given a ride by Joyce as it fell just short of the wall into the glove of Drew in right.

Clay Rapada came on for Bonderman in the 7th inning and made Jacoby Ellsbury look like the Statue of Liberty as he watched a called strike three. Dustin Pedroia then doubled and came around to score when Big Papi hit a single to the opposite side of the shift to give the Sox a 5-1 lead. Aquilino Lopez then came in and plunked Manny but got out of the inning by getting two fly ball outs.

Craig Hansen had worked a perfect 6th inning in taking over for Dice-K. However he struggled in the 7th inning.

Polanco led off with a single and then Carlos Guillen reached on an infield single. He then got a big double play ball off the bat of Magglio Ordonez with Polanco moving down to third. Hansen then got a little wild as he walked Cabrera and Sheffield to load up the bases. Terry Francona then went to the bullpen for Hideki Okajima. Marcus Thames pinch-hit for Joyce and delivered a single on the first pitch he saw from Okie for a 2-run single to cut the lead to 5-3. He then got Renteria to fly out to escape any further damage.

Big Papi gave the Red Sox an insurance run in the top of the 9th when he hit a home run off of Tigers closer Todd Jones.

Jonathan Papelbon came in for the second night in-a-row and shut down the Tigers to save Dice-K’s 5th win of the season in picking up his 10th save.

Tim Wakefield will toe the rubber tomorrow night for the Red Sox while Nate Robertson gets the ball for the Tigers.

Notes and musings:

Red Sox @ Tigers boxscore 5-3-08

This was game 1 of a 10-game road trip for the Sox. This matches the longest trip of the season as the Sox have 2 more 10-gamers scheduled, May 23-June 2 and June 27-July 6.

Sunday’s victory improved Boston’s Fenway Park record to 14-5 (.737).

In the last 3 days, Boston has improved its team average from .278 to .286, 2nd highest in the majors to Atlanta (.287).

Tonight for the 2nd time (April 23), the Red Sox’ top 4 selections in the 2005 First Year Player Draft are all on the active major league roster: Jacoby Ellsbury, Craig Hansen, Clay Buchholz, and Jed Lowrie.Hideki Okajima has now allowed 8-of-11 inherited runners to score so far this season.

The Red Sox improved to 7-8 on the road this season.

Jason Varitek said after the game that Dice-K was still feeling the effects of the flu and went out and did what he could for the Red Sox tonight.