For the 10% of the country that got to see Daisuke Matsuzaka pitch on Saturday night, they saw a Dice-K we’ve only seen in the WBC. He’s had an up-and-down season so far but it was all on the up-and-up at Citizens Bank Park.
Dice-K went 7 2/3 innings before giving up a hit as the Boston Red Sox went on to a 5-0 win over the Philadelphia Phillies in front of 45,310 crazy Phillies fans.
It’s the fourth win in five games for the visiting nine from Boston as they improve to 23-21. The NL East-leading Phillies fall to 26-16.
This was a better version of the Dice-K we saw two outings ago. You know the one who attacked the strike zone and didn’t nibble. Ironically enough, it also came with Jason Varitek behind the plate like that start.
The one hit he gave up with two outs in the 8th inning was almost caught by Marco Scutaro but Juan Castro’s flare fell over his outstretched arms to drop in. Other than the four walks he allowed, that was the only blemish on a great night for Dice-K. He also got some good defense behind him including a great diving stop by Adrian Beltre that turned into a double play. He even snared a line drive off the bat of Jayson Werth in the 7th.
Daniel Bard worked a perfect 9th inning to preserve the one-hitter for Matsuzaka, who also had his first MLB hit with a single.
Beltre had two hits and two RBIs while Jeremy Hermida added a hit and an RBI. J.D. Drew, who is battling a sore hip flexor, added two hits and an RBI. David Ortiz had a hit and an RBI and Jacoby Ellsbury was 0-for-4 with a walk and run scored in his return to the Red Sox lineup.
The Red Sox got on the board in the 4th inning off of Phillies starter Kyle Kendrick.
Drew led off with a single but was retired on a fielder’s choice by Big Papi. Beltre followed with a double to put runners on second and third with one hit. Hermida then hit a shallow fly ball to left field and Big Papi decided to tag up and barely beat the throw home to make 1-0 Red Sox.
Besides Dice-K shutting them down, the big blow to the Phillies and Kendrick came in the 5th inning.
Scutaro led off with a double and went to third on a sac bunt by Dice-K. After a walk to Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia popped out to second. Drew then added a single to score Scutaro and Big Papi followed that with a double to score Ellsbury to make it 3-0. Beltre knocked out Kendrick from the game with by clearing the bases with a 2-run double.
This was a solid outing for Matsuzaka on the bump. Hopefully he’ll sit back and watch the tape and learn from it and do it again in his next start.
Tim Wakefield will look to continue the string of good starts for Red Sox starting pitchers as he’ll square off tomorrow afternoon at 1:35 p.m. with Roy Halladay.
