Justin Verlander shut down the Boston Red Sox for eight innings and Ryan Raburn knocked in the only runs in the Detroit Tigers 2-0 win in front of 37,556 in afternoon baseball at Fenway Park on Thursday afternoon.
The Red Sox fall to 65-49 and are now 6 games behind the New York Yankees for first place in the AL East pending the outcome of their game on Thursday night in Seattle. The Red Sox lead in the wild card over this weekend’s opponent, the Texas Rangers, is back down to a half game. The Tigers (60-54) have a 2.5 game lead over the Chicago White Sox in the AL Central.
Clay Buchholz was a tough-luck loser on Thursday afternoon as he had his finest outing in a Red Sox uniform in 2009. He made just one mistake and that was to Raburn who took him deep. He went 7 innings, allowing 2 runs (1 earned) on 5 hits and 3 walks while striking out 3.
Manny Delcarmen walked one in his inning of work and Fernando Cabrera struck out all three batters he faced in his inning of work out of the Red Sox bullpen.
Verlander was filthy this afternoon as his velocity was there all afternoon. His last three pitches of the afternoon were clocked at 99 MPH, 100 MPH and 100 MPH in a strikeout of Jason Bay. Verlander allowed just 4 hits and had a walk while striking out 8 on the afternoon.
Fernando Rodney struck out one in the 9th to pick up his 24th save of the season.
Victor Martinez led the way for the Red Sox with 2 hits against his former AL Central rivals. Martinez also had just the second stolen base of his career. Jacoby Ellsbury and Josh Reddick had the other Red Sox hits.
It was the second straight outing that Buchholz didn’t receive any run support and you really hope that doesn’t weigh on his mind in his next start.
Big series for the Red Sox this weekend as they had to Texas to take on the Rangers. Jon Lester starts for the Red Sox tomorrow night and he’ll be opposed by Kevin Millwood.
