Travis Shaw watches his first Major League homerun fly out of Fenway. (Photo by Jim Rogash/Getty Images)

Travis Shaw made the most of his most recent call-up to the big club. Stepping into action after Sandoval got hit in his forearm on a swinging strike on Thursday, Shaw went 4 for 4 yesterday, including his first

and second major league homeruns, and a double. He drove in three runs, walked once, and scored all FIVE times he was on base, including once on a nifty slide to avoid a tag when the throw beat him to the plate. Pretty impressive stuff from the rookie. He’s definitely earned himself some more at-bats in the coming two months.

It was another great day for the offense. Everyone contributed (except Napoli, but he was probably tired from being the hero on Friday night), and they strung together a lot of good at-bats.

• Xander Bogaerts went 4 for 5 with an opposite-field RBI double that missed going out by a foot, a two out bases loaded single, and another stolen base. He continues to be unconscious with men in scoring position. This was his his 5th four-hit game of the season, and he’s now batting .319, tied for 4th in the AL with Jose Iglesias.
• Rusney Castillo was 3 for 4 with a double and three men driven in. His two-strike, two-out, two-run single in the bottom of the sixth (you may recognize this video from Shaw’s nice slide. Very observant, Mr. Reader) was huge and gave the Sox some much-needed breathing room.

Why did the Red Sox need breathing room in a game that they scored 11 runs? Good question. The Sox provided Joe Kelly with a six run cushion to work with, and for the first three innings, everything was a-okay. He allowed a single to the first batter of the game, but then retired the next 9 Rays he faced, striking out four. At the end of three, the score was 6-0 good guys. But then old Pumpsie became a little too enamored with his fastball and gave up two in the 4th, two in the 5th, and one in the 6th before being lifted for Justin Masterson. It’s really incredible how hittable his 98 MPH fastball is. There’s an old baseball adage about some guys who throw a “heavy ball’, meaning they may not be lighting up the radar gun, but batters have a hard time squaring it up and/or hitting it far. Unfortunately, Joe Kelly is the opposite of that. He throws a very light 98.

In any case, the offense did more than enough to back him, and he got the W, despite the following pitching line:

and bumping his ERA up to an unsightly 6.11.

Notes:

-I will be traveling for the next two weeks so Righty’s recaps may be at times a. late to post b. short and c. lacking in any sort of multimedia so if you notice these things, know that I’m not mailing it in. I apologize in advance.

-Red Sox team President and CEO Larry Lucchino announced that he will be stepping down after this season. I don’t really have a strong opinion about him one way or the other, but The Old Boy is thrilled.

-I’ve always thought that umpires names are a great representation of perfectly average American names. They tend not to have the cool, flashy names like a lot of the players, but good, honest, respectable names. Names you can do business with. Yesterday’s umps were Sam Holbrook, Greg Gibson, Clint Fagan, and Chris Conroy. Don’t those sound like the boxcar children’s dads?