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Sox Continue Inexorable March Towards First Place, 3-0, In Front Of Record-Setting Crowd
By Administrator | September 9, 2008
For the last several weeks, baseball fans in Florida and New England have known that September would be the critical month in the AL East pennant race. The Tampa Bay Rays had built their lead during July and August playing an easier schedule primarily at home, while the Red Sox had played a more challenging schedule on the road. But anyone who can read knew that would change in September…
The baseball schedule said that the Rays would be hitting the road against tougher competition while the Red Sox would be enjoying the comforts of Fenway Park.
And then there’s the whole experience thing… the Red Sox are a veteran team who have played in a lot of big games over the last five seasons while the Rays are a young team that has not experienced anything remotely resembling a “big game” in its franchise history.
And so when we turned the page to September the stretch run began… and while the Red Sox have played extremely well the Rays ship has begun to take on water. The surging Red Sox have cut five games of the Rays division lead in just eight days are now just one win away from passing them into first place.
Last night, the Red Sox improved to 7-0 against the Rays at Fenway Park with a 3-0 win over the AL East leaders. With the win, Sox starter Jon Lester improved to 9-1 at Fenway Park this season… he is now 4-0 in seven career starts against Tampa.
After the game, Rays manager Joe Maddon said: “We’ve just run into a little bit of a snag hitting-wise and when you don’t hit, all of a sudden everybody wants to magnify the negativity about it… We’re playing well right now, we’re just not hitting”. But the facts don’t support his story… the fact is that the Rays have not played good ball since September 1st — they have neither pitched well nor hit well. In the last seven games, yhey have surrendered thirty-seven runs while scoring only twenty-one times…
That’s not ‘good baseball’, Joe.
Last night they got a solid effort from starting pitcher Edwin Jackson, who allowed three runs in the first inning but then shut the Red Sox down for the remainder of the evening (7 IP, 3 ER, 8 H, 2 BB, 6 K)… but the Rays offense was unable to do anything against Lester, who improved to 14-5 with 7 2/3 outstanding innings of work. The southpaw allowed only six hits while striking out nine (tying a season high set in his no-hitter back on May 19th)… the only down side to the outing was that he still throws too many balls (he walked three batters).
But a shutout is a shutout is a shutout.
With two outs in the eighth, Lester gave up a single to Ben Zobrist and a ground-rule double to Carlos Pena… after his 119th pitch, Terry Francona pulled him in favor of closer Jonathan Papelbon, who came in and struck out three of the four batters he faced (including Rocco Baldelli to end the eighth) to record his 36th save.
Coco Crisp went 3-for-3 and extended his hitting streak to 10 games… he is 21-for-37 in that stretch, improving his batting average from .256 to .291 with his sixth straight multihit game. He also stole his twentieth base of the season. Jason Bay had two hits, including his 28th HR of the season, while David Ortiz and Kevin Youkilis added rbi-hits.
Kotsay, batting leadoff, walked to open the game and scored on a one-out double by David Ortiz. Ortiz scored on a single by Kevin Youkilis, who was thrown out in a rundown. Bay followed with his sixth homer since being acquired by the Red Sox.
THAT was all of the scoring in the game.
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The Red Sox played before their 456th straight regular-season home sellout crowd, a new major league record. Before the game, owners John Henry and Tom Werner, president Larry Lucchino and several players greeted some of the 37,662 fans who attended the game.
The Cleveland Indians set the previous record from June 1995 to April 2001, at Jacobs Field.
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With his rbi-single in the first, Youkilis has now reached base safely in 42 straight games.
Topics: Sox Games, Sox Players |
