Boston extended Toronto’s losing streak to eight games with a 9-3 shellacking of the Blue Jays behind seven very solid innings from Daisuke Matsuzaka and four more Red Sox homeruns. The Red Sox had a great start to the game and got Daisuke a quick first inning run behind two walks (Coco Crisp and J.D. Drew – intentionally), a base hit by David Ortiz, a passed ball by Jays back stop Sal Fasano and a RBI ground out by Manny Ramirez. Mike Lowell walked as well but Tomo Ohka got out of the jam by getting Jason Varitek to pop up with the bases loaded.

The Red Sox picked up some more runs for Matsuzaka in the second and padded his lead when Eric Hinske walked, Dustin Pedroia bunted and was given a single but an error was charged to Ohka when he tried to push the ball to Lyle Overbay at first base. Julio Lugo grounded out to score Hinske and it was 2-0. With two out Ortiz ripped a RBI double to left to score Pedroia from third and it was 3-0. Ohka looked really shaky, his pitch count was up and the Jays had action in the pen in just the 2nd inning.

Matsuzaka though was dealing, his curve was really breaking and after whiffing the side in the second he struck out his 4th Blue Jay batter in a row to start the third inning. But a one walk to Alex Rios, then a ground out by Adam Lind moved Rios to 2nd. A Matsuzaka wild pitch put the speedy Rios on third with two out and Vernon Wells up and threatening to get the Jays on the board. But Wells grounded out to Lugo to end the inning and the threat.

Nice play by Pedroia to start the 4th. Frank Thomas ripped a line drive up the middle off Matsuzaka’s glove that was knocked down by Pedroia who threw out Thomas at first. Thomas looked like he was having trouble running to first on the play. I think it’s because his uniform pants are too tight.

Ortiz leads off the 5th with his third hit a single. He was erased on a Manny Ramirez double play. Drew walked, Lowell singled and that chased Ohka after 4 and 2/3rds.

Rios continues to mash Boston pitching, he got his second hit of the game (Toronto’s third overall) a bases empty two out double in 5th off Matsuzaka. That was followed up with his third walk of the game this one to Lind and it brought up Wells as the tying run. But he flew out to Drew in right field to end the threat. It was the second time in the game Matsuzaka got Wells out with a RISP.

NESN’s Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy were sporting black “Matsuzaka-san” headbands in the booth in the top of the 6th. And they brought good luck as Pedroia led off the inning with a hit and Lugo hit a 2-run homer to left centerfield for a 5-0 Boston lead. Ramirez after going 0 for 3 with a RBI in his first plate appearances hit a two out solo homerun to make it 6-0. The homerun was the 53rd in Manny’s career off of Toronto pitching.

After getting his 8th strike out to start the sixth and the second out in the inning on a come backer to the mound, Matsuzaka gave up a line drive homerun to Overbay on a change up. Remy had been quick to note all game that the change up was the only pitch he didn’t seem to have command of. It was the third homerun of the year allowed by Matsuzaka and cut the lead to 6-1.

Freakin’ Rios, had another hit off of Matsuzaka. His third hit of the game was a flair single to right with two out in the 7th. But he got out of the inning by getting Lind to fly out to Ramirez. It was Matsuzaka’s last inning his final line was 7 IP, 1 ER, 5 H, 3BB, 8 K. It was definitely his best outing in his last 3 or 4. He had made some adjustments to his between games and pre-game routines and I think he will probably stick with what he did for a while, which included a 100-pitch side session the other day in the bullpen.

Crisp got on with two out in the 8th, stole second and went to third on an error by Fasano. It was Coco’s 6th stolen base of the season. That was promptly followed up by the 9th homerun of the season for Ortiz to increase the Sox lead to 8-1. It was also Big Papi’s fourth hit of the game.

Brendan Donnelly pitched a 1-2-3 eighth and in the 9th the Sox padded their lead to 9-1 with a solo homerun from Lowell, it was his 6th of the year and his second in the last two games. It was the 8th homerun hit by Boston so far in the series and their 13th in 5 games at Rogers Centre this year.

Overbay greeted Joel Piniero with his second homerun of the game, it was his 5th of the year and cut the Boston lead to 9-2. Aaron Hill then shot a double over Drew’s head in right and it looked like pre-game BP all of a sudden. Jonathan Papelbon started to loosen not because they needed him but to possibly get him some work. Piniero then got the next two outs but that guy Rios got his forth hit driving in Hill to make it 9-3. Piniero then struck out Lind to end the game.

Tomorrow the Jay’s look to break their losing streak and send ace Roy Halladay to the mound against Tim Wakefield. First pitch is at 7:05 p.m.

Read on for more on the game after the jump.

Notes and Musings:
The game featured just the 4th head-to-head match up in major league history of Japanese born starting pitchers.

Matsuzaka v Ohka

It was seen by 21,874 at the Rogers Centre.

The first was in 1999 when Detroit’s Hideo Nomo faced Seattle’s Mac Suzuki. Suzuki was a part of the first three such match ups facing Nomo twice and Ohka once.

Can the Blue Jays clubhouse guy please give Frank Thomas a larger uniform? He looks like he needs to lube up to squeeze his ass into the one he wears.

Three Jay’s in tonight’s lineup had never faced Matsuzaka even though the righty had already made two starts against them. They were Troy Glaus, John McDonald and Sal Fasano.

Kevin Youkilis didn’t start after being hit in almost the same spot the last two games. Former Jay Hinske played first and hit 8th with Crisp sliding up to the #2 slot in place of Youkilis.

Ohka walked four of the first 8 hitters. His previous high in walks this season had been three, he finished with five walks 4 2/3 innings.

Geddy Lee of Rush wasn’t at the game tonight, he has season tickets behind home plate, but it looked like two guys in Red Sox jerseys were in Lee’s seats. I wonder if Geddy uses ‘Stub Hub’?

NESN’s Orsillo and Remy can’t wait for the Sox Appeal series to start so they can have some fun with it. After telestrating the pizza toss, throwing paper airplanes and losing it when Ramirez decided to rub Julian Tavarez head I can only image the loss of self control in the booth this summer (I personally can’t wait). In Remdawg’s dating tips, Jerry recommends not to start rubbing your date’s head right out of the shoot and to wait until at least the second inning of the date.

Jay’s rookie outfielder Lind had struck out the first four times (once tonight) he had ever faced Matsuzaka until he grounded out in the third inning.

NESN’s top of screen game line the one that has the score, the base runners and count hasn’t been working since about the 3rd inning of Tuesday’s game. And they are using a different box in the lower right hand corner that isn’t as nice and is way more obtrusive so it isn’t always on screen. I don’t know what the problem is with the usual top bar, maybe it didn’t make it through Canadian customs. The top bar re-appeared somewhere around the sixth or 7th inning so I guess the Mounties went easy on it.

The black “Matsuzaka-san” headbands Don and Jerry wore in the booth in the top of the 6th are available on the remyreport.com. Jerry mistakenly forgot to get Tina Cervasio one. Jerry had it run down to Tina in the bottom of the inning and she was sporting it during her 7th inning report on another Japanese import, Hideki Okajima.