Seriously, I got into my car at 9:45pm last night expecting to catch the end of the Sox game as I got out of rehearsal. But instead I hear John Rish, and he’s not giving the game highlights – he’s giving the out of town scores. My first thought was maybe one of the pitchers threw a no hitter (I would have been frustrated to find out that I had missed another one). But that wasn’t the case.
As it turned out, I missed an awesome pitchers duel between Brian Tallet and Tim Wakefield. Although it wasn’t a no hitter, it was quite a battle by both pitchers. Wakefield got the win after pitching an impressive 8 innings while only allowing 5 hits and 2 walks. He surrendered one homer to former Red Sox player Kevin Millar (boy did he crush that ball). He also struck out three. To top it off, it was only a 97 pitch effort by Wakefield. I wrote earlier this season about how this is the complete opposite I was expecting Wake’ to pitch this year, and I couldn’t be happier that he’s proving me wrong. Keep it up, Wake’!
Meanwhile, Tallet got the loss by default, but that was a tough one to give him considering how well he pitched (6.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 5 K). He ran into a little trouble in the 2nd, giving up an RBI single to Jeff Bailey. Then he gave up another run, but was only scored by a sacrifice fly by Kottaras. To me that’s one heck of a performance.
Other notes: Jacoby Ellsbury continued his hitting streak with a single in the fifth inning. I’m excited to see where this is going to go. Obviously when you talk about hitting streaks, you automatically think to Ryan Zimmerman and his 30 game hit streak that was recently ended. I dunno if Ellsbury is going to last that long with his streak, but I’d love to see him do it. Maybe he can join Wakefield in the players that have proved me wrong this season (but don’t get me wrong, Ellsbury is having a great season and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him as an All Star this year).
Papelbon recorded his first perfect save this season and now has 11. And speaking of All Stars, I can’t wait to see Papelbon come into the game this year and NOT get booed.
They’re currently talking on 850 AM WEEI “The Big Show” about David Ortiz and the obvious. I’ve talked about this before and I’ll say it again, I believe that this is just a slump for Ortiz. It’s a long one but he’s going to come out of it. Varitek did the same thing last year and has hit 5 homers and 9 doubles so far this season – not a whole lot, but he hit 13 homers and 20 doubles last season. He could easily pass those numbers this year. So like I said, Ortiz is coming back. No need to worry.
Keep the Faith.
Keywords: Boston Red Sox, Brian Tallet, David Ortiz, Jacoby Ellsbury, Jason Varitek, Jonathan Papelbon, Tim Wakefield, Toronto Blue Jays
