On a night where the strike zone seemed as big as California, it was Chris Young and not Tim Wakefield who took advantage of it by striking out 11 Red Sox batters as the Padres destroyed the Red Sox 6-1. Khailil Greene was the main villain on Saturday night as he smashed two Wakefield pitches into the seats in left field. Just like when he was with Boston, Josh Bard hurt the Red Sox this time with his bat, as he had a homer, a double and 3 RBI. In case you have a short memory, Bard was Wake’s personal catcher for the first month of the 2006 season and allowed 10 passed balls in 7 starts before being shipped out to San Diego along with Cla Meredith for Doug Mirabelli.
The Red Sox never had a batter reach 3rd base during the game until two outs in the 9th when David Murphy had a triple. Murphy would come around to score on a Mike Lowell double, for the only Red Sox run of the night. They also didn’t make a groundball out until the 7th inning as all the outs were either strikeouts or flyouts during that time.
Young struck out 2 batters in the 1st inning, 2 in the 2nd, 2 in the 3rd, 1 in the 4th, 3 in the 5th and 1 in the 6th inning. He was perfect through 4 innings but lost the no-no in the 5th when J.D. Drew led off with a single. Lowell reached on an error by Kevin Kouzmanoff but then Young struck out Mirabelli, Julio Lugo, and Wake to get out of the inning.
After an easy inning for Wakefield in the first, the Padres struck for a run in the 2nd. Mike Cameron led off the inning with a bunt single and promptly stole second with Bard at the plate. Bard launched a double driving in Cameron with the first run of the game. Greene got Bard to third with a deep fly out but with the infield in, Termell Sledge grounded out to second, keeping Bard at third. Kouzmanoff stranded him at third by flying out to Coco in center.
Wake was solid in the 3rd and 4th innings, getting 2 batters by strikeouts, 2 on groundballs and 2 of the flyball variety. The 5th wasn’t so kind as Greene launched the first of his two homeruns, making it 2-0 Pads. Wake got Sledge to strikeout for the first out of the inning. Kouzmanoff followed with a single and went to second on a sacrifice by Chris Young. Wake then hung a first pitch curveball to Marcus Giles who hit it into the gap in left-center for a double that scored Kouzmanoff and made the score 3-0.
The 6th inning brought the end of the night for Wake and also for manager Terry Francona. After a Adrian Gonzalez fly out, Cameron doubled to deep center. Bard then hit a long fly ball to left that was initially ruled a foul ball. This brought Padres manager Bud Black out to argue and ask 3B ump Brian Knight to get some help. After a conference, it was ruled the ball hit the foul pole and was ruled a 2 run homer. TV replays clearly showed they made the right call. Francona took exception to this and went out to argue the call with Knight. They actually had to stop arguing for a second as some idiot threw a water bottle at Francona. When they moved our to third, Francona finished his arguing and was given the boot out of the game. The homer by the way gave the Padres a 5-0 lead.
Greene followed all that with his second homer of the night and that chased Wake from the game. Mike Timlin came in and got Sledge and Kouzmanoff to end the inning with the Padres leading 6-0.
Wakefield’s line: 5 1/3 innings, 8 hits, 6 runs (all earned), no walks and 4 strikeouts.
Young’s line: 7 innings, 1 hits, 2 walks and 11 strikeouts.
Sunday’s game brings the best pitching matchup of the series as Josh Beckett takes the hill for the Sox. He will be opposed by Jake Peavy. Gametime is 4:05 PM.
Curt Schilling is back in San Diego with the team. Still no word on his return.
Tim Wakefield had made only 1 career start against the Padres (1993) before tonight’s game.
Former Sox centerfielder Fred Lynn was at the game. So was the First Lady of Cal-E-fornia, Maria Shriver.
Big Papi put on a show during batting practice again today by using an aluminum bat.
Tina Cervasio reported that Julio Lugo is having trouble sleeping because of the huge slump he is in.
Mike Cameron came into the game with 6 consecutive strikeouts against Wakefield.
Kevin Youkilis has 118 consecutive errorless games at 1st base. He needs one more to tie the Sox record.
Doug Mirabelli got booed when he came up for his 1st at-bat.
Chris Young’s career high for strikeouts is 12.
A relative of Wally the Green Monster was spotted in the stands.
