Well, as gloom and doom as the first part of last week was for the Sox, it ended on a positive note as they have now won 3 in a row, after taking 3 out of 4 from the Chicago White Sox. They finished off the longest home stand of the season, 6-5. The lead in the East stands at 7 1/2 games, as the Yankees tore apart the weakest pitching staff in baseball for 49 runs in three games, glad the Red Sox have 15 more against the D-Rays. Also, Jon Lester will be called up to start on Monday in Cleveland, his first MLB action since being diagnosed with Cancer last year, he will be taking Julian Tavarez spot in the rotation.
Highlights from the weekend
*Beckett gets win #13 in a 10-3 stomping of former Yankee Jose Contreras. Beckett had 10k's, his only blemish was a three run homer to Jim Thome. This game set the tone for the series. J.D. Drew hit what was an apparent three run homer in the first, however the umpires saw it differently, saying it went high off the wall. One run scored but Manny was thrown out at the plate. Tito came out to argue the call, but to no avail, he ended up getting tossed. Couple this with a pre-game closed door meeting, where Tito told the team to relax, I would call this great coaching. Getting kicked out lit a fire under the Sox and it continued burning all weekend. Coco's triple in the 5th proved to be the game winner, as he laced a ball down the first base line into the tricky right field corner to clear the bases. One negative of the 5th was Big Papi trying to stretch a single into a double, he got thrown out and to add insult he jammed his shoulder , which cost him the rest of the series and it looks like a couple more games this week. The Sox finished off Contreras in the 8th, with Julio Lugo grand slam.
J.D. Drew went 2-4, but red hot Julio Lugo was the hitting star 3-4, 4Rbi's, 2 Runs and a steal, how we were throwing him under the bus not so long ago! The Sox offense once again pound out 10 hits.
*Gabbard pitches another beauty, he now 4-0 and has made a real case to remain in the starting rotation when Schilling returns. Hegave up only 3 hits and retired 15 of 21 batters via the ground ball. Behind the offense surge of Coco Crisp the Sox pummeled the White Sox 11-2 for the victory. Crisp has been on fire the last month of the season, hitting a robust .370 and finally showing the reason why Theo traded for the speedy center fielder. He drove in a career high tying 5 runs, as he came to bat with the bases loaded three times during the game. Twice he delivered the key hit with 2 outs. The Sox finally figured out to score with RISP, as they have struggled in this situation all year. In this game alone they were 5-12 with 11 Rbi's!!! 11 more hits
*The Sox finished off the home stand with another victory 8-5, behind 6 1/3 solid innings from Wakefield, as he improved to 11-9 on the season. The game was well in hand 8-1 in the 6th, when things got a bit shaky.
The Sox really made White Sox starter Jon Garland work in the first, Lugo worked an 8 pitch walk, Cora fouled off pitch after pitch, a 9 pitch a bat before being retied on a nice play by Alex Cintron at second base. Youk worked another walk (8 pitches). Then Manny crushed a home run to deep right into the Sox bullpen for a quick 3-0 lead. Manny has owned Garland in his career hitting over .500 against him with now his 3rd home run.
The Sox finished off Garland in the 5th, with Mike Lowell delivering the knockout punch with his 15th home run of the season, a line shot into the monster seats for a 6-1 Sox lead. The Sox added some more insurance in the 6th, on a Youkilis sac fly and a single by Manny, his 4th rbi of the game. Wakefield in the 7th gave up a single to AJ Pierzynski and then a ringing double to left from Jermaine Dye, after a sac fly to make it 8-2, Josh Fields added another single that plated Dye to make it 6-3, that was it for Wakefield and on came Manny Delcarmen. Delcarmen has been awesome of late but today showed he was human and why he struggled so much last year, he had major control issues, after a single to Juan Uribe, he walked Jerry Owens to load the bases. Cintron followed with a single and then Jim Thome was walked on 4 pitches to make it 8-5, with only one out and the bases still loaded and the ever dangerous Paul Konerko coming up. Manny got tough and retired Konerko on a pop-up to first, Okijima came on a struck out Pierzynski to end the threat. Papelbon came on in the 9th to close things out, he was greeted with back to back singles and then walked Alex Cintron to load the bases with no one out and the heart of the White Sox order coming up. Not the way it was planned out, but Paps showed why he is so good, as he came back to over power Thome striking him out of three straight fastballs. He then got Konerko to ground into the game ending double play and the near disaster was advert for save number 22. The Sox get 10 hits once again.
The Sox with RISP the final three games of series were 13-31 with 28 rbi's, that's getting the job done.
Check out these guys stats this weekend
Coco Crisp 8-17 8 rbi's 2 runs, mostly from either the 7th or 8th position
Julio Lugo 6-16 5 rbi's, 4 runs, 5 walks
Manny R. 5-13, 4 rbi's, 5 runs
Lowell 4-13, 4 rbi's, 5 runs'
Fun Stat
Only once in the last 11 games have the Red Sox failed to get 10 hits in a game
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