6N Blog

Well the Red Sox had seemingly let a win slip away from them (literally) tonight at Fenway, but somehow pulled a 9-8 victory out of their collective asses with an assist from home plate umpire Rick Reed.

In the bottom of the ninth with the Angels up 8-7, Nick “Why yes, I’m slaying Watney” Green fouled off roughly 800 pitches against Anaheim closer Brian Fuentes before working the count to 3-2 before taking a pitch that really should have been a called strike three. Fuentes slammed the mound and Angels manager Mike Scioscia looked like someone just ran over his cat with their car right in front of his face.

After Green walked to plate the tying run, Alex “G-Love” Gonzalez hit a bloop single into left to score J.D. Drew from third to steal the win away. It was the cap on a night that was full of ups and downs for Boston.

Paul Byrd took the mound for the Sox to start the game and was decent once again, going 5.1 innings and giving up three runs, but could’ve given up about 10 if the wind hadn’t kept several Angel fly balls in the yard early on. After Byrd departed, Saito, Ramirez, Okajima, Delcarmen, and Bard looked anywhere from great at points to horrible at others over their combined 3.2 innings of work.

The Sox went into the seventh inning with a 5-3 lead, thanks to a five-run bottom of the sixth against Angels starter Joe Saunders. Ramirez relieved Saito with one out in the inning and Vlad Guerrero on first. Torii Hunter popped out to Petey at 2nd for the second out of the inning. Ramirez then struck out Kendry Morales, but the pitch squirted through “sure-handed” Jason Varitek’s legs, allowing Morales to reach and keeping the inning alive.

The shit then hit the fan for RamRam, who allowed an RBI single to Howie Kendrick, a two-run double Juan Rivera, and another RBI double to Mike Napoli. Okie Dokie relieved Ramirez and struck out Chone Figgins to finally end the inning. Again. Score? 7-5 Angels.

In the bottom of the 8th, Big Papi scored on a Casey Kotchman ground out to make it 7-6 Anaheim, then Jacoby singled two batters later to score Josh Reddick (who pinch hit for Tek) to tie it all up at seven going into the 9th.

Josh Bard came in for one his patented “I throw 99 but right down the middle” appearances, allowing the go-ahead run on three straight singles to Figgins,  Erick Aybar, and Bobby Abreu  after getting the first two batters of the inning to ground out. Once again, the Sox trailed going into the bottom of the frame.

Scioscia brought in Fuentes who was looking for his 42nd save of the year and who hadn’t pitched in three days. He got Jason Bay and Mike Lowell to fly out, and after an Ortiz walk and an infield single by Drew, Terry Francona sent Jed Lowrie up to pinch hit for Varitek’s defensive replacement Dusty Brown. Lowrie smoked a slider down the third base line that was somehow stopped by Figgins at third, but nonetheless extended the inning as the bases were juiced, allowing Green to pinch hit for Kotchman.

Tomorrow night, Josh Beckett takes the hill against Ervin Santana as the Sox try and sweep the series. Texas lost tonight, so the Sox are 6.5 games up in the Wild Card standings.