Red Sox News & Notes – 8/14

Jacoby Ellsbury(notes) #2 of the Boston Red Sox is tagged out by catcher Josh Bard(notes) #3 of the Seattle Mariners on a fly ball to right field by Dustin Pedroia(notes) at Safeco Field on August 13, 2011 in Seattle, Washington. Ellsbury was initially ruled safe, but the ruling was changed to an out call.

With Josh Beckett on the hill for the Boston Red Sox last night, we knew it might be another one of those nights for the offense since they had averaged 3.17 runs in Beckett’s starts this season. They did get four runs for him but unfortunately it wasn’t enough as they fell 5-4 to the Seattle Mariners.

The reason four runs wasn’t enough for the Red Sox is the fact that Beckett had an uncharacteristic bad 1st inning. And by bad, I mean awful.

Ichiro Suzuki took the first pitch he saw from Beckett and took it out of the park for a home run. The Mariners followed that up with three straight hits and just like that it was 3-0. Two batters later, it was 5-0 when Casper Wells hit a two run blast.

The Red Sox had a run taken away from in the 4th inning on a disputed call at home plate. Before I describe the play, I will say that without a doubt, the umpires ended up getting the call right. Some Red Sox fans won’t agree with me but honestly the umpires got it right.

Dustin Pedroia hit a fly ball to right field to Ichiro. Jacoby Ellsbury tagged up and made his way home colliding with Josh Bard after Ichiro’s throw was perfect. As Bard was laying on the ground, home plate umpire Mark Ripperger called Ellsbury safe. Mariners starter Felix Hernandez along with manager Eric Wedge protested the call.

After some consultation with his fellow umpires, Ellsbury was ruled out on the play. This brought out Terry Francona to argue the call and eventually find himself tossed from the game. He would eject the umpire on his way out. Francona said after the game he never received an explanation of why the call was reversed.

With watching the game on television at home, we were privy to some slo-mo replays of the play at the plate. You could see Bard showing the ball to Ripperger who must have initially thought Bard dropped the ball. The replay showed he did drop the ball on his chest protector but that was AFTER he had shown the ball to Ripperger.

It would end up that the disputed call would turn out to be the difference in the game.

In the 6th inning, the Red Sox would finally get to King Felix when Ellsbury and Pedroia would each hit two-run homers. But that’s all they would get as Jamey Wright and Brandon League would shut them down the rest of the way.

Tough loss for the Red Sox even if the umpire got the call right. It was definitely not what expected from Beckett either. The good thing that despite his high pitch count early on, Beckett settled down and kept the score where it was. In the end, it just wasn’t enough.

The loss coupled with the New York Yankees win over the Rays cuts the lead in the AL East back to a game over the Yankees. A win today would be a nice thing before heading into tomorrow’s off day.

We’ll be back in a while with this afternoon’s lineups, batter/pitcher matchups and links from the day. 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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Sox can’t recover [Boston Globe]

Ortiz sure looks like a keeper [Boston Globe]

Blasts from the past [Boston Globe]

Sox can’t climb out [Boston Herald]

Phocus needed as Sox near October [Boston Herald]

Beckett gets Sox off to a rough start [Boston Herald]

Wily Mo back with a bang [Boston Herald]

Drew mulls surgery [Boston Herald]

Wake goes back [Boston Herald]

Beware the Rays [Boston Herald]

Jacoby Ellsbury: ‘From my angle, it looked like he got the call right’ [Clubhouse Insider]