The Tampa Bay Rays got 4 home runs off the combination of Jon Lester and Paul Byrd to beat the Boston Red Sox 9-1 in front of 38,031 stunned fans at Fenway Park. The win gives the Rays a 2-1 lead in the best-of-7 ALCS.
Jon Lester could not deliver a win for the Red Sox today.
All season long the Red Sox have counted on the left arm of Lester and unfortunately he just didn’t have it today. He looked shaky at times and the Rays took advantage of him as he went 5 2/3 innings, allowing 5 runs (4 earned) on 8 hits and 2 walks while fanning 7.
If you could take anything from Byrd’s 3 1/3 innings where he gave up 4 runs on 5 hits, it’s the fact that he allowed Terry Francona to preserve the Red Sox bullpen for what is now a huge Game 4 tomorrow night.
Dustin Pedroia continued his recent hot streak as he was 2-for-3. Mark Kotsay chipped in with 2 hits as well while J.D. Drew, Jason Bay and Alex Cora had the other hits in the losing effort. It also didn’t help when as a team the Red Sox left 13 runners on base, 8 of them in scoring position.
It looked like it was going to be a dominating outing for Lester as retired the Rays in order in the 1st on just 5 pitches.
Rays starter Matt Garza kept the Red Sox hitters off balance all night with his fastball and mixed in his other pitches as well.
He got Jacoby Ellsbury to fly out in the bottom of the 1st before a Pedroia double high off the wall. Garza left Pedroia stranded there though as he struck out David Ortiz and Kevin Youkilis to ground out to short.
Lester walked Evan Longoria to start the 2nd and then struck out Carl Crawford. Wily Aybar followed with a single and both Longoria and Aybar moved up 90 feet on a passed ball by Jason Varitek with Dioner Navarro at the dish. Navarro grounded out to second but Longoria scored to put the Rays out front 1-0. Lester struck out Rhode Island native Rocco Baldelli to end the inning.
The 2nd inning brought another inning of missed opportunities for the Red Sox.
After Garza struck out Drew, Bay followed with a single and Kotsay stroked a double to right center. Garza escaped the jam by striking out Varitek and got Cora to fly out leaving both runners stranded in scoring position.
Jason Bartlett led off the 3rd with a single and went to third on an Akinori Iwamura wall scraping double. The lead became 4-0 when B.J. Upton absolutely crushed a Lester offering over the Green Monster. After a strikeout of Carlos Peña, Longoria made it 5-0 with a home run in the Green Monster seats. Lester struck out Crawford and got Aybar to fly out but the damage was done.
The Red Sox would finally get a run across the plate in the 7th inning.
Varitek worked a leadoff walk off of Garza and went to third on a Cora single. Joe Maddon went to his bullpen for J.P. Howell and Ellsbury greeted him with sacrifice fly that cut the lead to 5-1. Howell got out of the inning as he got Pedroia to ground into a 5-4-3 inning-ending twin killing.
Carl Crawford tries to knock over Jason Varitek in the 8th inning.
Crawford led off the 8th with a single off Byrd and went to third on an Aybar single. With the infield in, Navarro hit a grounder to Pedroia who went home with throw to nail Crawford who try to bowl over Varitek but he held onto the ball. Fernando Perez came in to run for Aybar but it wouldn’t matter as Baldelli put a Byrd offering off the Sports Authority sign above the Green Monster to push the Rays lead to 8-1.
Peña added a solo home run in the 9th to provide the final margin.
The Red Sox will look to Tim Wakefield tomorrow night to even up this series at 2-2. If not the Red Sox will be facing a deficit that could be hard to overcome all though they did do it last year against the Cleveland Indians.
Notes and musings:
Rays @ Red Sox ALCS Game 3 Box Score
Dwight Evans threw out today’s ceremonial first pitch.
Jon Lester placed among A.L. leaders in shutouts (T1st, 2), ERA (4th, 3.21), winning percentage (4th, .727), starts (T5th, 33), innings (T7th, 210.1) and wins (T8th, 16).
Coming into today’s game, Boston starters are 9-0, 2.67 (24 ER/80.2 IP) over the last 13 post-season
games. The last defeat by a Sox starter in a post-season game was Tim Wakefield in Game 4 of the 2007 ALCS at Cleveland. The 9-game winning streak by starters is the longest in post-season since Yankee starters won 10 straight decisions in 1998-99.
Jonathan Papelbon has pitched 7.1 scoreless innings with 2 saves and win in 5 games of this post-season. He has extended his career post-season scoreless string to 22.0 innings in 14 games, the most career playoff innings in history without allowing a run.
Dustin Pedroia had 2 homers on Saturday for the 1st time in the majors:
It marked the 11th time that a Red Sox player has homered twice in a post-season game, 1st since Manny Ramirez in Game 3 of the 2005 ALDS vs. Chicago and just the 2nd in ALCS play, Johnny Damon in Game 7 in 2004 vs. New York. Pedroia was the 1st 2nd baseman with 2 homers in a playoff game since Boston’s Todd Walker in Game 1 of the 2003 ALDS at Oakland, the only other Sox 2B to do it.
Mike Timlin’s 24 career LCS appearances are one shy of Mariano Rivera’s all-time.
John Farrell’s ejection on Saturday was the 5th for a Red Sox in the post-season:
Bruce Hurst (1988 ALCS Game 3); Roger Clemens (1990 ALCS Game 4); Marty Barrett (1990 ALCS Game 4); and Jimy Williams (1999 ALCS Game 4).
