Results tagged “sportsredux”

The Sox are home, everyone's pumped for the Fourth of July, the weather is finally something not to be suicidal about...everything's great. Except that the Sox can't seem to beat Seattle.

The Red Sox staff had no answers for the bottom of Seattle's order as Rob Johnson and Ronny Cedeno combined to go 5-10 with five RBI in a 7-6 Sox loss in 11 innings. Johnson's two-run double in the 11th inning was the deciding hit in the game. Ramon Ramirez took the loss.

The Red Sox have returned home to find out which parts of Fenway haven't washed out to sea in the last two weeks. They'll play the Mariners to begin a 10-game homestand that will take us to the All-Star break; Oakland and Kansas City will follow. Red Sox history will be made tonight, weather permitting, as Tim Wakefield will make his record-breaking 383rd start for the team. Pushing that Clemens uncomfortableness out of the record book. We say "weather permitting", of course, because we've heard that the guys from Seattle are rumbling that Boston is a little too rainy and clammy and cloudy for them. Let's hope for the best.

So said Jonathan Papelbon afterwards. And if you're one of the millions who figured that (hour-long rain delay) + (10-1 lead) = (bedtime), we understand. Unfortunately, among the snoozing millions were the Sox bullpen, who turned a 10-1 lead into a devastating 11-10 loss in no time. This was ugly.

Some days you win, some days you lose, some days you can't buy a hit off a guy suffering from the flu. Tommy Hanson, who started for the Braves and shut down the Red Sox 2-1, told his roommate/carpool friend Kris Medlen to be ready to start, because he wasn't sure he'd be able to make it. The Braves waited for Hanson between inning with wet towels and plenty of fluids. Then he went back out and humbled the Sox again. "If he was sick," said a grim Terry Francona, "I really don't want to see him when he's not sick."

Who's the all-time leader for games started by a Red Sox pitcher? Trick question; there's a tie. Let's try it this way: who's the all-time leader for games started by a Red Sox pitcher who didn't end his Red Sox career with bitterness and acrimony, then go on to win championships with the Yankees and end his baseball career under a cloud of steroid-related suspicion?

OK, let's rationalize. The guy hadn't pitched in over a year. He was adjusting to a new league (wait, it's interleague play, that doesn't really count) and feeling the eyes of six million diehard fans on him, waiting for him to be the same guy he was in 1993. And he said afterwards that all in all, he felt pretty good back up on the mound. In other words, folks, we're going to give Smoltzie a mulligan.

Five of the six RBIs for the Red Sox came from David Ortiz and Jason Varitek? Is it 2003 already?!?

The last time the Red Sox played in Washington, D.C., Rogelio Moret got a complete game win on home runs by Joe Lahoud and Rico Petrocelli. A 32-year-old Carl Yastrzemski batted third and went 0-for-3. In other words, it was a long time ago. Back in the nation's capital, the Sox took a little time to assert themselves, but that's what they did, unloading on the hapless Nationals bullpen to run away with an 11-3 drubbing of the worst team in baseball.

Nick Green, who began the year as the Sox' third-string shortstop, may not stand out like flashy sparkles in the water or stars in the sky. But with Jed Lowrie out for who-knows-how-long, and Julio Lugo having been told that the Red Sox home park has been moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming (good move by the front office, by the way), the SS job may be Green's for the forseeable future. Keep having days like yesterday, Nick, and we'll all know why.

The Red Sox rotation is going through a little upheaval right now. But not Josh Beckett. This guy's job isn't going anywhere.

Daisuke Matsuzaka is a very rich man because he is an elite pitcher. He was, or should be. We think. His 1-5 mark and 8.23 ERA, made worse by an 8-2 loss to the Atlanta Braves on Friday, isn't good enough. What Tony Massarotti termed "The Dice-K Dilemma" is now at hand. Theo and Terry Francona are now faced with baseball's version of the Kobayashi Maru.

Sure, if you win the Stanley Cup, you get your name engraved on it, you get to take it home for a day to do whatever you want with it, and kids from Yellowknife to Halifax go to bed dreaming of it. But still, when your year is over, you usually have to give it back. Usually to the Red Wings.

By our unofficial calculations, 18.5 million people have gone to games at Fenway since the last time you could actually show up, cash in hand, and get a seat. That's more than the population of Chile or Greece. The Sox notched their 500th sellout in a row last night. And the fans, who came to celebrate that nice round number, got two for one, as Brad Penny got his 100th career win, beating Florida 6-1.

A bad day fishing is better than a good day almost anywhere else, they say. And when you play the Marlins, you're required to make fish jokes. So there you have it. The Sox returned to Fenway for their own Admiral's Feast last night, as David Ortiz homered (#5) and Tim Wakefield went to 9-3 for the year, grilling the fish 8-2.

A day after beating the Phillies 11-6, the Red Sox found themselves on the wrong end of that same score yesterday. That doesn't happen every weekend.

Hopefully, the Red Sox weren't planning on going out dancing after their first two games in Philadelphia. Extra innings on Friday, and an hour-and-a-half rain delay Saturday. At least Pat's is open 24/7 for a late night cheesesteak.

It's June. June 13. The game last night was the 61st game of 2009. But, it really could have been played in October. The last two World Series champions battled in a game the Red Sox won 5-2 in 13 innings in a game that was filled with great pitching, timely hitting and error-free defense. Bostonist is making no predictions but Boston and Philadelphia, well, hey, you saw the game. Admit it. You thought it, too. The Herald did it, too.

The Red Sox clearly felt their happy fans needed a little tension and drama last night. Why not? The Sox have proven so far this year that they can beat the Yankees in blowouts, in pitching masterpieces, in slugfests, in New York, in Boston, for richer, for even richer...why not save the good times for the end just once?

Why is Derek Jeter making this face? Is it just because the Yankees have now lost all seven games to the Red Sox this year? Is it because first place in the AL East just changed hands? Or is he just going loco after having to stand in the field for long inning after long inning while his pitching staff lets the Sox run around the bases?

Six games does not a season make. Even though some easily-swayed souls seem to think so. But regardless, the Red Sox are indisputably 6-0 against the Yankees so far in this young season, everyone's happy, and last night's game was about as good as it gets.

o...what's the deal with Daisuke? What's he really like? What's his favorite color? And why is he so maddeningly consistently inconsistent? After winning his last start, we expected good things out of Dice. Better things, at any rate, than his 5 2/3 innings of Texas Rangers batting practice yesterday.

A lot of Dates With Destiny from the Red Sox lately. A lot of good signs about the pitching. REALLY good signs. Tim Wakefield flirted with a no-hitter early in the season, Josh Beckett got a phone number in Detroit last week, and last night it was Jon Lester who was just an appletini away from a no-hitter. It wasn't meant to be, but his brilliant pitching and some powerful offense led the Sox to an 8-1 crushing of the Rangers at Fenway.

The Sox have it again. Somehow, they've got it. They finished up a road trip that looked dismal a week ago 6-4, thanks to completing a sweep of the Tigers yesterday in Comerica Park. Tim Wakefield fell behind 3-0 in the second? No problem!

This was the kind of Red Sox game we've been waiting for. Well, mostly. On the strength of a no-hit bid by Josh Beckett (he got into the seventh untouched) and some powerful offense, the Sox dusted the Tigers 10-5. A two-run J.D. Drew homer in the first got things started, and it was a 4-0 lead when the wild and crazy eighth inning started. In the top half, the Sox sent ten men to the plate and scored six of them, with back-to-back RBI doubles by Ortiz(!) and Varitek putting the game out of reach.

Milestone Reached: Red Sox manager Terry Francona, who got his 500th Sox victory with last night's 5-1 in Detroit. Tito joins Joe Cronin and Pinky Higgins in the exclusive club of Sox managers who haven't been prematurely (or correctly) run out of town. "That means I've been really lucky with an organization with a lot of players that have been very good," said the skipper.

Terry Francona tinkered with the lineup. Jon Lester trusted once again in his pitch mix. And the results were more than satisfactory, as the Red Sox avoided a sweep with a 8-2 win in Toronto.

If you were in pain watching the Sox yesterday, you weren't alone. Besides the existential pain of watching the Sox scratch out only four hits in their 5-3 loss in Toronto, there was the more immediate pain of watching Dustin Pedroia take a Brian Tallet fastball off the knee (he stayed in the game) and watching Rocco Baldelli slide knees-first at full speed into the outfield wall (he didn't). Baldelli's exit was particularly painful, since his two-run homer in the second accounted for most of the team's offense.

Unless they meet the Twins in October, the Red Sox played their final game in the unlovable Metrodome, and Terry Francona couldn't be happier. "I think this place stinks. This ballpark stinks." Between the plastic roof (colored the same as a baseball), the giant A/C vents, and the listless crowds that are there 90% of the time, it's hard to disagree.

If you can't be good, be memorable. Isn't that how the old saying goes? Well, it's a saying the Red Sox took to heart last night, tying a modern-day baseball record with six wild pitches - four by Daisuke Matsuzaka in his first game back - en route to a crummy 4-2 loss to the Twins.