Red Sox Win, Take Two of Three from First-Place Rays

Posted on June 29, 2015 in Game Recap
Mike Napoli gets ejected and gets his two cents in while John Farrell holds him back. (Photo by Brian Blanco/Getty Images)

Mike Napoli is ejected and gets his two cents in while John Farrell holds him back. (Photo by Brian Blanco/Getty Images)

The only good thing about playing baseball inside is no rainouts. So even though it was pouring in St. Pete yesterday, baseball happened at Tropicana Field.

The Red Sox have now won six of their last ten and have looked like a halfway respectable ball club. In the process they have guaranteed that I will remain optimistic about this team’s chances up until the All-Star game regardless of how they play in the coming two weeks.

Justin Masterson was effective in his triumphant return to the mound after missing a month and a half due to “injury” (read: ineffectiveness). The big Jamaican is back in the rotation after Joe Kelly out-ineffective’d him and got demoted to AAA.

Masterson mixed his pitches nicely and featured an exceptionally sharp slider. Costiglione and O’Brien used the word “devastating” more than once when describing that pitch. “Devastating” is thrown around pretty casually and has resultantly lost some of its punch, but at its core it’s is an awesome turn of phrase. A pitch is so nasty that it has left the batter not just angry or upset or disappointed, but devastated. The slide piece was coming in soft (right around 80MPH) and must’ve been tantalizing for the Ray’s hitters. His fastball velocity still wasn’t back up to pre-2015 levels but he was able to pump a few in there that topped 90MPH. Now we’re cooking with … kindling?

The end result was 0 earned runs, 6 strikeouts and 0 walks in 5 innings.

Pitchers IP  H  R ER BB SO HR ERA
Masterson (W, 3-2) 5.0 5 1 0 0 6 0 5.58

A few of the hits were bleeders or bloopers that found grass – I mean turf – thanks to the shift.

Masterson was countered by Chris Archer, unabashed hypocrite and arguably the AL’s best pitcher behind Chicago’s Chris Sale. The Sox were able to get to him to the tune of 3 four-baggers and 5 earned runs.

Sandoval got the fun started with a lined shot that he snuck inside the left field foul pole in the top of the second.

The next batter was Mike Napoli who worked the count full, only to be rung up on a slider that was off the plate outside by rookie umpire Tripp Gibson. Nap has been victimized by the MLB’s expanding strike zone a lot this season, more so than most other players because he sees a lot of pitches and tries to work the count. It would be somewhat understandable if his frustration just boiled over and got the best of him, even though the Red Sox were playing with a short bench. But that’s not what happened; Nap was walking back to the dugout, when Gibson ran him for not picking up his bat. Seriously. On a 3-2 pitch that was outside, Napoli dropped his bat on the plate, thinking he had earned a walk. After giving Napoli the bad news and some brief jawing, Gibson told him to pick up the bat when Nap had already walked away. Napoli told him the bat boy would get it, and Gibson tossed him. Napoli then got his money’s worth. My lipreading skills tell me he said “That’s horseshit! Are you fucking kidding me?” My thoughts exactly. The league should discipline Gibson and let him know that he can’t be pulling that crap.

The following batter was De Aza, who wasn’t going to wait around and get Tripp’d up by bad umpiring (sorry guys). He took Archer out to right on a first-pitch changeup, continuing his recent power surge. He’s been a nice pickup so far.

In the 4th, Papi took Archer deep on a slider and showed incredible restraint by not admiring his work, flipping his bat, and taking a 50 second tour of the bases.

Notes:

–Jonathan Aro was ineffective again and will most likely be riding the Merloni express back down to Pawtucket in the near future.

–Deven Marrero made his major league debut when he replaced Napoli. He was 0-3 at the plate but made this mint stop at second to steal a hit and save a run in the bottom of the 8th, killing the Rays’ rally. Pedey would be proud.

–Jackie Bradley Jr. was 0-4, but hit a couple balls right on the screws and looked comfortable at the plate. Hopefully he doesn’t get discouraged and change his approach because those balls should start falling soon.

–Xander was 2-4 with a double and 2 runs scored, batting out of the three-hole. He’s now hitting .294 and is 2nd in the league in fielding percentage for shortstops. He hasn’t consistently showed the power that we were promised, but this kid is still only 22 years old. Nomar was 23 during his rookie season.

 

Round and Round We Go…

Posted on June 28, 2015 in Game Recap

This is about right.

Like Righty, my time has been pretty occupied with a bachelor party this weekend. But we power through for the loyal fans. Also I lost all the money I allotted for gambling at Foxwoods. I guess that’s what happens when you take a chance to try to make it happen.

Anyway, I have a wedding in two weeks, and I’m going to get wedding attire today, so I don’t have much time and I’m running on empty. So I’m just gonna give you the facts.

The Red Sox had three hits on the night. Matt Andriese dominated, retiring 18 of 19 Boston batters before being taken out. He must be on a pitch count or something, because he’d only thrown 70 pitches to that point. He only gave up a single to Xander Bogaerts.

The scoring in this one came exclusively on home runs. Alejandro De Aza gave the Red Sox their only run, taking Kevin Jepsen deep in the top of the 8th inning to cut the lead to 3-1, Rays. Tampa’s first baseman, Jake Elmore, hit a two-run home run in the 5th inning off Wade Miley, who struck out eight and deserved better.

Matt Barnes relieved Miley one out into the 7th inning and gave up a solo shot to the second batter he faced, catcher Rene Rivera. He also served one up to Evan Longoria in the 8th, shortly after De Aza’s shot.

That’s all I got. Another loss for the books.

 

Righty Drops the Ball

Posted on June 27, 2015 in Uncategorized
Brock Holt drove in the game winning run in the 10th and his hair looked great. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

Brock Holt drove in the game winning run in the 10th and his hair looked great. (AP Photo/Chris O’Meara)

Sorry you guys. Last night was my buddy Geoff’s stag do and I didn’t get to bed until 5. I was planning on blogging as soon as I woke up, but by the time I rolled over at 12:30PM I had completely forgotten. I didn’t even do anything this morning. I played Backyard Baseball for PS2 for an hour and a half.

Anyway the Red Sox won last night in 10 innings.

Porcello had a quality start.

Pitchers IP  H  R ER BB SO HR ERA
Porcello 6.0 9 3 3 1 5 0 5.54

De Aza had an RBI double in the top of the 2nd. JBJ also had a sac fly in that inning.

Napoli scored on a double steal with Swihart in the 4th.

Xander made a heads up play in the bottom of the 8th, cutting down Longoria who was trying to advance to 3rd with one out.

Mookie sparked the game-winning rally with a leadoff double in the top of the 10th, extending his hitting streak to 13 games in the process.

The next batter was Brock Holt! who singled Betts home, giving the Red Sox a 4-3 lead.

Koji closed the door with a 1-2-3 bottom of the tenth with two strikeouts.

All Red Sox starters had one hit, except for Ortiz who had two.

Another Loss PLUS Celtics Draft Analysis Kinda!

Posted on June 26, 2015 in Game Recap

This frickin' guy. (Photo by Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images)

Here’s what I think about Eduardo Rodriguez: he’s electric and capable of dominance until he’s not. From my spot on the couch, it’s very easy to point at the screen and say, “It’s a mental issue. When things don’t go his way, he falls apart.” Because that’s what my eyes tell me. In six games started so far, he’s either been lights out or gone to pieces after defensive lapses. But who knows? It could be random, or it could be something else entirely.

After retiring 10 straight Baltimore batters to start the game and being spotted a one-run lead, Rodriguez gave up a clean double to Chris Parmelee. He got the next batter, Nolan Reimold, to offer at a low pitch with a check swing, but Reimold made contact and the ball bounced to Rodriguez’s right. He checked to see if he could get Parmelee at third (he couldn’t), had to rush his throw to first to try to get Reimold, and threw it away. Parmelee came around to tie the game, and the wheels came off from there. Gordon Edes thinks it’s because he went to the stretch, but whatever the cause, the results were: two-run home run, single, single, double (scoring two runs), single, sacrifice fly. Alexi Ogando came in to record the last out of the 4th. 6-1, Orioles.

But the farther back we’ve gotten in the playoff race (ha), the more I’ve come to expect a little fight from the Sox. And they did fight back, putting together singles from Napoli and Sandoval for Alejandro De Aza to knock in with a home run, his first in Boston, wrapping one around Pesky’s Pole.

But Tommy Layne and new call-up Jonathan Aro weren’t effective enough to keep the Red Sox deficit to 2 runs, giving up 2 more over the course of the 6th and 7th innings. Xander Bogaerts did his best in the 7th inning, bringing Betts in from first with an RBI double and scoring from third on a wild pitch, but that was the end of the scoring. Let’s move on.

Actually, wait. Jackie Bradley, Jr. nailed David Lough at home on a fly ball to right field in the top of the 9th, and MLB did a cool video segment thing that you should watch.

Notes:

Bonus! Celtics Draft Analysis with as Much Optimism as I Can Muster

Full disclosure, I fell asleep before the Celtics’ second 1st round pick.

16th pick: Terry Rozier – No more Phil Pressey? I mean I love the guy, but Rozier has to be an upgrade. Other than that…gimme a break, I have no idea. I can just parrot stuff I’ve read about him if you want. He’s the next Marcus Smart! Wait, don’t we already have him? Hmmmm. Seems to rebound well. Looks like he makes his free throws for the most part. Active hands on defense. Not a ton of assists.

28th pick: R.J. Hunter – You remember this, right?

Clearly a deadly sharpshooter with cojones the size of watermelons.

33rd pick: Jordan Mickey – Automatic 4 blocks and 10 rebounds a game. Boom. For real though, he had 6 or more blocks 10 times last year. Not bad.

45th pick: Marcus Thornton – Good shooter, but I feel like we’ve seen this story before with Celtics draft picks. Not to mention, he’s probably not even as good as the Marcus Thornton we had last year.