Final Score: Boston Red Sox 4, Arizona Diamondbacks 3Things I love? One run victories, extra inning wins, strong deep bullpens and clutch hits. Things I hate? Nail biting in late innings, leaving men on base and ummm Julio Lugo.
I’ll get to that last item in a second, but first let me reflect on this titanic comeback victory over this desert dwelling foe. Seriously, it looked like it was 230 degrees by game time… how do you play in this heat? I sweat through my pants just watching them take the field. Tavarez don’t sweat (he bleeds) and managed to pitch a solid 6 innings only giving up 3 runs. He through about 500 pitches an inning, but still had enough for a bloop single/bunt/monstrosity type deal when called upon to hit. Not that his pitching mattered, cause the bats were dead again. Ugly times at the plate through 5 innings.
Then Tek said “Enough with this garbage” and put one into the seats in the 6th inning. If that weren’t enough, he also tied it with a double in the 8th to prove that:
a) Yes he IS the man
b) No you CAN’T touch him
Phenomenal performance by the captain who had a chance to be an ultimate hero in the 10th with the bases loaded and no outs… but came up short with a swinging K. Not to worry though, cause pinch hitting master Mike “The Hammer” Lowell got a huge sac fly to put the Sox on top for good. Mmmmm happy pants.
The other heroes were the inhabitants of the Sox bullpen. Donnelly, Oki and Paps allowed no runs in 4 innings of work. Oki and Paps struggled a bit, but you couldn’t tell from the scoreboard. Deep breaths are ok as long as the job gets done.
And I guess that brings me to my only real gripe of the day. Julio Lugo is my new whipping boy. Unlike my past targets on this team, he can’t field like the nimble Coco and he can’t get the slap hits like Pedroia. Besides, those are the 8th and 9th batters… Lugo leads off. He needs to get his bat on the ball, NOT hit into double plays and for the love of Pete take a pitch so he can get on base. You know? Just to find out what it’s like out there.
If that was the only problem I could handle it… hell he hit a homer yesterday… but the other issue lies with his fielding, rather his inability to. Unlike Coco the vacuum, Lugo just sucks. He had an error in this game, but the “infield hits” that are really hotshots to his body are starting to pile-up at an alarming rate. It’s getting to the point where I hold my breath every time a ball is hit to the left side. Mr. Noglove McAwfulthrow is gonna boot it and throw it into the stands. I just know it!
Lugo you need to shape up or join the ranks of Nomar, O-cabs, Renteria and Gonzo. Actually, I wish you had the skills of any of those guys at this point. Maybe they should have kept one of them?
No no no… can’t let my head wonder too much into negative town. I love the win too much for that to happen. Sunday Dice-K gets to test his chops against RJ, the Big Unit. He needs to cut Randy down to size samurai style. HAI YAH!
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