Lester, Pappy Can’t Make Offense Stand Up; Twins Rally For 7-6 Win |

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Lester, Pappy Can’t Make Offense Stand Up; Twins Rally For 7-6 Win

By Administrator | May 10, 2008

Jon Lester was lousy… Julio Lugo committed ANOTHER costly error (his eleventh error in six weeks) and Jonathan Papelbon blew his second consecutive save opportunity as the Red Sox fell to the Twins, 7-6, at the Hubert H Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis.

In spite of Lester’s unworthy effort and Lugo’s continuing struggles with the glove, the Sox offense put Papelbon in position to secure the team’s twenty-fourth win of the year (and to put them 10-games-over-.500 for the first time this season)… but on this night, on this RARE occasion, he just wasn’t up to the task. Unlike the blown save in Detroit a couple of night’s ago, a game in which he was more a victim of some horrible luck, last night he BLEW it… he screwed up… he wasn’t up to the challenge.

It wasn’t the leadoff hit that ultimately hurt him, although that baserunner would eventually score the game-tying run… rather it was his inattention to that runner, and a subsequent baserunner, that was more egregious. Hey, batters get hits… it happens. But pitchers don’t have to pitch to subsequent batters with nary a check on the baserunners. Both runners in the inning stole a base on HIM — Jason Varitek had NOTHING to do with the steals. NOTHING! Delmon Young (the batter who stroked the leadoff single) stole third base after being sacrificed to second base, and Carlos Gomez (who walked with two outs and scored the eventual game-winning run) stole second base. On Pappy.

Of course, in my opinion, Jason Varitek is somewhat culpable in the ninth-inning debacle from this standpoint: what the h-e-double-hockey-sticks was he doing calling a split-fingered fastball on the last pitch of the game? Mike Lamb had NO CHANCE of hitting Pappy’s fastball. NONE. ZERO. ZILCH. NADA. He was as over-matched as “over-matched” gets. He was lucky to even get his bat on the previous pitch.

I was thinking to myself, ’stay with the fastball - don’t speed up his bat’ just before the final pitch was thrown… the ball wasn’t even to home plate yet and I was thinking: WHAT?!?!

Lester allowed two runs in the first inning on three singles and a ground out. After the Red Sox tied the game in the top of the second, Lester allowed two more runs in the second — the Twins cause being abetted by Lugo’s error — but nonetheless it was Lester who threw the (bad) pitch that Brendan Harris lined into left-center field to drive in the runners.

The Twins scored another run in the fourth inning that never should have scored. Matt Tolbert hit a single into left field that was played into a double by the lolly-gagging Manny Ramirez. Lester then wild-pitched the runner to third base before Gomez singled him home. Hey Manny, smarten up!

But the Sox scored four runs in the fifth inning — their last runs of the night, as it turned out — to take the lead and set up the ninth inning fold. The big blow was struck by the rampaging Mike Lowell, who drove a two-run double into left field (scoring Dustin Pedroia and David Ortiz)… and he eventually scored the lead run on a wild pitch by reliever Juan Rincon. The Sox third baseman is 10-for-24 in his last five games, with two HR and seven ribbies.

David Aardsma (2/3 IP) and Hideki Okajima (2 IP) provided near-perfect relief before the game was turned over to Papelbon in the ninth inning. Pedroia, Lowell and Kevin Youkilis each had two hits… Jacoby Ellsbury had a hit and a walk (raising his OBP to nearly .400) and stole his 14th base of the season without being caught. He is now 23-for-23 in his brief career and closing in on the MLB record for most steals at the beginning of a career without being caught (27, Tim Raines).

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Ellsbury and Pedroia combined on a nice relay play in the sixth inning to throw out Delmon Young, trying to score from first base on a double, on a bang-bang play at home plate.

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Youkilis and Lugo stole bases to extend the team’s streak of consecutive successful attempts to twenty-two, a team record. The streak ended later in the game when J.D. Drew was thrown out trying to steal second by Joe Mauer.

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Has NESN ever had a more attractive reporter working for them than Heidi Watney? She is a ‘honey-limbed lovely’. (”Beautiful Girls” reference for you movie fans)

It remains to be seen if she knows the game of baseball or has any talent as a reporter, but she doesn’t have to do very much to be an improvement on her predecessor — Tina Cervasio didn’t set the bar very high. Cervasio doesn’t know the game of baseball very well, oftentimes asked insipid questions, and couldn’t utter a sentence without stumbling over her words. I am convinced she was related to someone.

Here’s hoping Watney has even a little bit of talent… cuz her blonde hair, blue eyes and cover-girl-good-looks are quite pleasing to my sensibilities. Welcome aboard, Heidi.

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The teams play the second game of this four-game series tonight at 7 PM… Daisuke Matsuzaka (5-0) will be opposed by rookie Glen Perkins, making his first career start for the Twins… the game will be broadcast on NESN and WRKO (680 AM).

Topics: Sox Games, Sox Players |

2 Responses to “Lester, Pappy Can’t Make Offense Stand Up; Twins Rally For 7-6 Win”

fc Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Wasn’t that relay play to home Ellsbury to Pedroia, rather than Ellsbury to Lugo? It sparked several online discussions I was in re how we seem to be playing *around* Lugo now - understandable, but untenable in the long run.
Administrator Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Correctamundo! Ellsbury’s throw sailed over Lugo’s head and my initial reaction was: ‘he missed the cutoff man’ — until the ball came to rest in Pedroia’s glove. As I wrote the post at 5:00 AM that little tidbit had slipped my mind. Thank you.