Julio Lugo broke a serious slump with a pair of hits and two RBI and Jason Varitek also drove in two runs as the Red Sox behind 8 shut out innings from Daisuke Matsuzaka sunk the Tampa Bay Devil Rays 4-1 at Fenway Park. Matsuzaka was impressive once again picking up his 10th win of the year while only allowing 4 hits, 1 walk and 9 K’s and looks like a serious All-Star game snub. He will go for win #11 on Sunday in Detroit.
In what started like it might be a pitcher’s duel in the Fens between Matsuzaka and Scott Kazmir (5-5 4.28 ERA), turned ugly for the Tampa ace in the second inning.
After a quick 1-2-3 first for Kazmir he got a Kason of the Gabbard’s and walked the bases loaded to start the second. Manny Ramirez, Kevin Youkilis and Mike Lowell were all issued free passes. Jason Varitek then hit a sure fire double play ball to second baseman Ty Wiggington who booted it and was only able to get the out at first allowing Ramirez to score and give the Sox a 1-0 lead. With runners at 2nd and 3rd Wily Mo Pena would then strike out. This would bring up Julio Lugo starring at a 0 for 33 streak and it looked as if Kazmir might escape with only one run being run allowed. But with the cheers of pink hats raining down upon him Lugo, who hadn’t had a base hit since June 14th, would drive one up the middle and give the Sox a 3-0 lead. Lugo would smile, the pink hats roared their approval and the Hallelujah Choir sang. JUL-IO LUGO, JUL-IO LUGO, HALLELUJAH, JULIO LUGO, HALL-E-LU-JAH!!!!!!!
On the other side Matsuzaka (10-5 3.53 ERA) would cruise through the first three innings allowing only two out singles in the first to Brendan Harris and in the second to Delmon Young. He also had one strike out in each inning and the Rays went 1-2-3 in the third.
In the home half of the third it looked as if the Sox might get Kazmir on the ropes again as Dustin Pedroia led off with a single but was quickly erased when David Ortiz grounded into a double play and then Ramirez ended the inning with a ground out.
Matsuzaka was doing his part after a 1-2-3 4th inning in which he had the last two outs on whiffs of Brendan Harris and Greg Norton he had set down seven Tampa hitters in-a-row and had retired 12 of the first
14 hitters.
Kazmir looked to have settled down after the rough first inning. He got two quick outs in the 4th striking out Youkilis and getting Lowell to fly to right. Varitek followed with an excuse me single to right and Pena would go down hacking for the second time on the night to end the frame.
Daisuke started the fifth with his sixth K of the evening, this time getting Wiggington, he would snap is streak of 8 retired in-a-row when he hit Young with a pitch. Matsuzaka would come back to strike out Jonny Gomes and with Dioner Navarro at the plate Varitek would throw out Young trying to steal second to end the inning.
Kazmir started the fifth at 80 pitches and would strike out Lugo, then give up a double down the left field line to Coco Crisp but the Sox would strand him as Pedroia and Ortiz would each ground out.
Matsuzaka would start and end the sixth would a pair of fine defensive plays. First he made a nice stab on a high bouncer and threw out Navarro. Akinori Iwamura who had struck out his first two times at bat would hit the ball off the wall and was nearly thrown out at second by Crisp but Pedroia couldn’t hold the ball after making a quick sweep tag. Carl Crawford would line out to Youkilis and then Harris would line out softly to Matsuzaka to end the threat.
In the sixth the Sox would add a run to their lead when with one out Youkilis would single to left off of Iwamura’s glove. Lowell would get an infield hit to third and then the runners would move up a base when Iwamura threw the ball into the photographer’s well. Varitek would then hit a sac fly to right to score Youk for his 2nd RBI of the night and Pena would go down swinging for the third time on the night. At this time I could smell a “Golden Sombrero”.
The seventh would see Matsuzaka walk his first batter, issuing a lead off free pass to Carlos Pena. But Norton, who struck out his first two times, would hit into a 4-6-3 twin killing and Wiggington would ground out to Lugo and the Rays were done.
Lugo would greet Jason Hammel with his second hit of the night (quick someone check to see if the space aliens are landing) and then get promptly picked off when he started to steal and then just changed his mind and couldn’t get back to first. Hammel would issue back-to-back walks to Crisp and Pedroia, then get back-to-back strikeouts of Ortiz and Ramirez to end the inning.
Matsuzaka would start the 8th striking out Young, Gomes singled on a two strike pitch and stole second. Navarro would fly out to center moving Gomes to third but the Rays would leave him there when Iwamura would whiff for his third time on the night and Matsuzaka’s 9th K of the game and his final out. He would head off to a standing ovation.
Shawn Camp would pitch the 8th for the Rays. After getting Youkilis to ground out and striking out Lowell, Varitek would walk giving Pena his shot at the Golden Sombrero. After being up in the count Wily Mo would not disappoint as he ended up whiffing for the fourth time in four plate appearances on the night.
After throwing 122 pitches that was the end of Matsuzaka, so Jonathan Papelbon came on in a non-save situation to pitch the ninth. Paps blew threw the first two Tampa batters whiffing Crawford and getting Harris to fly to Crisp. But Boston native Pena would break up the shut out with his 19th HR of the year down the right field line cutting the lead to 4-1. Papelbon came right back and closed out the Rays when he got Norton to pop out to Lowell to end the game.
Notes and Musings:
Giants OF Barry Bonds hit career HR #751 tonight in Cincinnati off of Aaron Harang.
Coco Crisp returned to the lineup after missing the last three games with an injured thumb.
Each team struck out 10 times. Pena 4x, Manny 2x lead the Sox, while the Rays Iwamura had 3 K’s and Norton had 2.
22% of the remaining games are against the Devil Rays.
When Double L said Theo Epstein’ s name during the pre-game show the hand he was holding the microphone with started to violently shake.
Double L says if Jim Rice makes the HOF the Sox would retire his number. Jim Rice DESERVES to be in the Hall.
Sunday after the game don’t miss “Daisuke Matsuzaka: Rising Sun” and “The Best of Remy and Orsillo” on NESN. More “Original NESN Entertainment”. You’d think the Sox owned NESN or something. What? Really?
Is it me or was Roger Clemens uniform screaming “UNCLE!!!” last night?
The Devil Rays lead the AL with 578 strikeouts but have the highest ERA at 5.62. No team in AL history has ever lead the league in K’s and had the season’s highest ERA.
Tampa Bay’s Akinori Iwamura has hit against former fellow Japanese Leaguer Daisuke Matsuzaka. Prior to tonight, the two have met on three different occurrences in their careers. Twice during interleague play in 2005, Iwamura with Yakult (Central League) and Matsuzaka with Seibu (Pacific League), and once in the 2006 All-Star Game. Iwamura is 2-for-7 off Dice-K with a single, HR and 4 strikeouts.
Heading into tonight’s game Scott Kazmir was 5-2 2.60 ERA in 11 games vs. Boston. His two losses have come at Fenway Park. Now he has a third.
The Rays Delmon Young is the brother of Washington Nationals All-Star Dimitri Young.
As of today, Hideki Okajima has overtaken Jeremy Bonderman for first place in the vote for the 32nd player on the AL roster. Vote for Okajima at www.redsox.com, www.mlb.com or by texting A5 to 36197 by Thursday night at 6 p.m. ET.
