So Righty and I were in the ballpark tonight, taking in our first live game of the year. Pretty exciting stuff. Let’s not waste time up here, I’ll get right to it.

Actually, no. So I bought chicken tenders and fries for dinner at Fenway because I am five years old, but this “meal” cost me like 9.25 or something and only came with two tenders!

That’s all I really have to say about that, but I think we can all agree that it’s an atrocious miscarriage of justice and it resulted in me eating like eight E.L. Fudge cookies when I got home. I told you, I’m five.

All right, the section about Lefty’s personal problems is over.

1st Inning: Gonna be honest, I think we walked in as Pedroia came up to bat. Hey, we have day jobs, all right? Plus this one started at 6:10. Anyway, Pedroia and Ortiz both singled, but nothing came of it. In the top half, I guess Masterson dropped the ball during his pitch delivery and was called for a balk, but nothing came of that either.

Top of the 2nd Inning: Desmond doubled and Espinosa walked, setting the table for the centerfielder Michael Taylor, who I’d never heard of but who is apparently incredibly fast. Anyway, the Nationals chose this moment to run a double steal, which didn’t work out so well. With the lead runner gone, Masterson still gave up a single to the 9-hole hitter Taylor, who then stole second fairly easily with Escobar at the dish. This was the first sign of Taylor’s speed on the night – he clearly had the green light as soon as he got on base, and even a good throw (which didn’t happen) would probably not have caught him stealing at second. Fortunately, Escobar grounded out to Brock Holt at shortstop to end the frame.

Bottom of the 2nd Inning: 

After Napoli reached on a first-pitch single to lead off, Holt (who, after tonight’s 2-4 performance, saw his average sink down to .636) hit a two-out single and Betts knocked both Nap and Brock in with a double down the left field line that rattled around a bit in the corner.

3rd Inning:

Masterson’s only quiet inning of the night, setting down Werth, Harper, and Zimmerman in order. Werth, in his second game back from injury, had the green light on a 3-0 count and flew out to right.

Sandoval got hit in the foot by a Strasburg pitch here and stayed in the game. However, he’d come out later, being replaced in the batting order by Allen Craig and at third base by Hanley Ramirez. I read somewhere that he was fine. INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM.

After an excellent take-out slide by Sandoval on a potential Napoli double play ball, Nava knocked in Hanley with an RBI single and Hanigan brought in Napoli with the same.

4th Inning:

Not much. Masterson got out of a 2 outs, men at the corners jam. Pedroia hit a solo home run that barely cleared the Monster. It’s just so silly to miss high and inside against him. Dear all pitchers: don’t do that. Well, I prefer that you do, but it just seems like a dumb move.

5th Inning:

This is where the wheels came off for Masterson. 6 runs in one inning, yuck. Two hit batsmen, a walk, and three singles. With the score tied and men on first and third, Farrell brought in Alexi Ogando, fresh off his first poor performance of the year, allowing 3 runs in two-thirds of an inning against the Yankees. Ogando wasted no time in giving up a bases-clearing triple to Michael Taylor (who, with a little help from a Mookie Betts bobble, made it to third base easily – this kid is seriously lightning fast), but settled down after that, retiring the next four batters he faced.

Now down two runs, the Sox went down in order in their half of the 5th (although Napoli did show that he can still hit the ball a mile).

6th Inning:

Nothing doing for the Nationals, but the Sox showed a little fight. Holt singled, after which Strasburg was pulled in favor of Craig Stammen (who’d only end up facing two batters – not much Stammen-a if you ask me! I’m so sorry). Betts reached on a fielder’s choice and stole his 3rd base of the season, but I’m also pretty sure that was a pitch before Pedroia walked anyway. Ultimately, it came to nothing as David Ortiz grounded into a shift, 4-3.

7th Inning:

Edward Mujica pitched well in a non-pressurized situation, three up and three down with a K on Desmond to end the top half.

And this is where the wheels came off for the Nationals. This video can explain so much better than I can. So this dude Blake Treinen came in after that stiff Matt Thornton hit Victorino (who came in for Sandoval, shifting Nava to left and Hanley to third) and got Napoli to fly out to Bryce Harper in right. Harper’s arm, by the way? Not that impressive. I’m not well-educated enough to know if I should actually be surprised by this, but still.

Anyway, so Treinen comes in, hits Craig on his first pitch (Matt Williams should probably have yanked him then and there) and then his very next pitch results in a game-tying comedy of errors in which he scoops up a weak Hanigan ground ball, drops it while in the act of tossing it underhand to Wilson Ramos, then frantically picks it back up and throws it into the stands to try to catch the runner at home. Could’ve been a double play! Instead, Treinen is credited with two errors on one play and the score is tied at 7 (here is a picture of Blake Treinen. Now that I have seen this picture, I am less surprised about how his Tuesday night went).

Of course, the Sox still needed another run, so who came through? Brock Holt, obviously. Grounded out to the shortstop to drive in Craig, nothing fancy. Pretty terrible, confusing decision by Desmond not to throw home.

8th Inning:

Mujica struck out Espinosa to start the inning, then gave way to Junichi Tazawa, who gave up a single to Escobar, who then advanced on a wild pitch thrown to Jayson Werth. But Werth struck out looking moments later to end the inning.

Papi did the right thing in the bottom half by grounding into a shift-induced double play to speed the game up. Yes, I would’ve preferred we scored runs, but come on. We won, don’t get on my case.

9th Inning:

My scorebook for this inning reads: K, F7, K. Great comeback outing for Koji, right? In some ways, yes. His splitter is as devastating as ever. But his susceptibility to being taken deep remains…scary.

In any case, though, he got the save in typical one-two-three fashion. That about wraps it up for the first live Lefty and Righty game viewing of the year. As usual, I’ve written too many words. Good thing they’re all so interesting and vital.

Oh wait, game notes:

• Pedroia was great: 3-4 with a walk and a home run.
• Masterson was ugly, looking much more like the 2014 version than the 2013 version. Even apart from the one terrible inning, it wasn’t very clean pitching.
• I don’t actually have much else to say, I just wanted to put in a game notes section.
• Very important statistic
• Witty observation
• Okay sorry, this is really the end now