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BOSTON STRONG -
THE ROAD TO REDEMPTION
John Lackey halts the Red Sox
skid with a strong performance
August 17, 2013 ...
A day after playing one of their worst games of the season against the Yankees, the Red Sox came back and beat their rivals, 6-1, before a sellout crowd of 37,517 at Fenway Park. John Lackey put together his best performance in a few weeks, snapping Boston's three-game skid.
Over 6 2/3 innings, Lackey scattered six hits and a run, walking three and striking out a season-low of one. He threw 103 pitches, 65 for strikes. 15 of his 20 outs came via the ground ball. When he walked off the mound, Lackey got a huge ovation
from the Fenway faithful.
Lackey, who has been plagued by a lack of run support for most of the season, didn't run into that problem in this one. With the win, Lackey is 8-10 with a 3.22 ERA. It was his first victory since July 12.
The Sox put together a rare strong showing against Hiroki Kuroda, who came in with a 2.33 ERA. The offense had big performances from Jacoby Ellsbury (three hits) and David Ortiz (homer, double). Mike Carp,
Daniel Nava, Shane Victorino and Will
Middlebrooks added multi-hit performances.
The Red Sox rallied against Kuroda in the fourth. Ortiz started it by rifling a ground-rule double to right. Carp's single put runners at the corners with nobody out. After a strikeout by Nava,
Stephen Drew hit a fielder's choice grounder that Lyle Overbay threw away for an error. Ortiz scored on the play for the first run of the game. Carp and Drew then executed a
double steal. Middlebrooks and Ellsbury came through with two-out RBI singles to make it a 3-0 game.
Lackey took a shutout into the fifth, even if he wasn't overpowering. The Yankees finally put something together in the fifth. Overbay led off with a single and Chris Stewart
followed with a ground-rule double. Ichiro Suzuki got his team on the board with a groundout. Overall, Lackey did a nice job in that frame of minimizing the damage. With two outs in
the seventh inning, Lackey hit Chris Stewart with a pitch. Breslow replaced him and Lackey walked off knowing his first win since July 12 was secure. Breslow, Junichi Tazawa, and Koji Uehara finished off the Yankees from there.
It was one of those rare days in which Kuroda didn't seem to have his best stuff and the Red Sox capitalized. Nava led off the sixth with a double off the Green Monster. Jarrod Saltalamacchia
smoked an RBI single. The best swing of the inning came from Ellsbury, who hit a rocket double off the wall in right. Robinson Cano's relay throw home was way off the mark as
Saltalamacchia scored. In the seventh, Ortiz mauled a solo homer to center -- No. 425 in his career.
The fielding was crisp and the relief pitching stellar. With Tampa Bay losing, the Red Sox lead the American League East by two games again. After losing three straight games and four of five, the Sox were back to being the team that has made this season such a
memorable one. Only one Red Sox team has gone the entire season without a four-game losing streak. That was in 1903, the franchise's first World Series champion. That team had Cy Young.
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DUSTIN PEDROIA |
First baseman Mike Napoli was scratched from the Red Sox lineup before Saturday's game against the Yankees with a sore left foot. Dustin Pedroia had an eventful 30th birthday. The Red Sox arranged for a video of his son, Dylan, singing "Happy Birthday" to be
playing on the scoreboard when he came out of the dugout before batting practice. Once the game started, Pedroia didn't have as much fun. He was 0 for 5 with two strikeouts and fouled a ball off his left ankle in the eighth inning.
Clay Buchholz threw 65 pitches over four simulated innings in the bullpen, some with teammates Ryan Lavarnway and Brandon Snyder standing at the plate. Bullpen coach Dana Levangie also stood in. Will Middlebrooks has hit safely in all seven games he has
played since returning from Pawtucket. He is 10 of 23 (.435) with three RBIs and three walks in that time. |
