Red Sox News & Notes – 7/24

Jacoby Ellsbury(notes) #2 of the Boston Red Sox hits a 2RBI single in the seventh inning against the Seattle Mariners on July 23, 2011 at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts.

While the heat wave has been reaching milestone highs this week in New England, there were some other milestones reached on Saturday night at Fenway Park.

Dustin Pedroia extended his hitting streak to a career-high 20 games, Terry Francona got his 1000th win as an MLB manager and oh yeah, the 3-1 win for the Boston Red Sox extended the Seattle Mariners losing streak to 14 games. That 14-game losing streak ties a Mariners franchise record.

Boston Red Sox manager Terry Francona, left, celebrates with closer Jonathan Papelbon(notes) after defeating the Seattle Mariners 3-1 in a baseball game in Boston, Saturday, July 23, 2011. The game was Francona's 1000th win as a manager. For about seven innings with the Red Sox offense being shutdown by Mariners rookie Blake Beavan, it didn’t look like Tito was going to get that 1000th win. And with Josh Beckett on the mound it was probably no surprise to anyone out there that the Red Sox weren’t scoring runs.

The Red Sox always seem to struggle with pitchers they’ve never faced before and giving Beckett just 3.71 runs of support in his starts this season, it looked like more of the same. But they would finally breakthrough in the 7th inning to provide Beckett with his 9th win of 2011.

Over the first six innings, the Red Sox managed six hits off of Beavan. In the 7th inning though it was a different story after Mike Carp had hit a solo home run, his second home run in as many as nights, in the top half of the 7th.

Beavan had actually gotten the first two outs of the inning before giving up a single to Jason Varitek. Marco Scutaro followed that with a ground rule double to right field that got Tek to third. Had an idiot fan not reached over to grab the ball, Tek would have possibly scored to tie the game up.

But Jacoby Ellsbury made sure that Red Sox Nation wouldn’t vilify the stupidity of the fan as his single brought in Tek and Scutaro to give the Red Sox a 2-1 lead and chase Beavan from the game. Former Red Sox pitcher David Pauley came in and gave up a single to Dustin Pedroia that moved Ellsbury to third.

Aaron Laffey came in and allowed Pedroia to steal second with Adrian Gonzalez at the dish. A wild pitch by Laffey allowed Ellsbury to score and make it 3-1.

Daniel Bard took over for Beckett and made things interesting. But after loading up the bases with no outs, he worked himself out of the jam and extended his scoreless streak to 24 innings over his last 23 appearances. Jonathan Papelbon allowed a hit to start the 9th but retired the next three batters to pick up his 23rd save and his second in as many nights.

Another solid effort by Beckett as he was pretty much in control all night long. He mixed up his pitches well and made the right pitches when he needed too. He did get himself in trouble but as he would say, he executed the pitch he wanted at the right time to help himself out.

Now in a few hours, the Red Sox will look to extend the Mariners futility before the Kansas City Royals come to the Fens for a four-game set.

We’ll be back in a short while with this afternoon’s lineups, batter/pitcher matchups and links from the morning. But for now, enjoy the overnight links from the media by clicking on the read more button below if you’re on the home page.

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Video: Mike Lowell Throws Out First Pitch at Fenway [SOX & Dawgs]

Video: Jerry Remy Calls Mike Lowell an “Arrogant Athlete” [SOX & Dawgs]

Special delivery [Boston Globe]

Francona has managed nicely [Boston Globe]

Beckett holds the fort [Boston Globe]

Lucchino: Sox not shy about making first move [Boston Globe]

No waiting around [Boston Herald]

Josh Beckett cool in duel again [Boston Herald]

Clay Buchholz concerns fuel trade rumors [Boston Herald]

Jarrod Saltalamacchia preps for knuckler [Boston Herald]

Roster equation has ‘X’ factor in Josh Reddick [Boston Herald]