Recap MLB 07 - Game 6

Final score Boston 3 - Texas 2. Boston wins the final game of the 3 game series in Texas ending their opening road trip at a 3 and 3 mark.

Where do we begin? How about we start with our players of the game? Big Papi, Schilling and Papelbon all share the honors.

Big Papi gets 3 RBI's with a 1st inning solo shot and a 3rd inning home run with Cora on 2nd base. These were the first home runs he has hit this year and only his 4th RBI. Good to see him hitting the ball hard, let us hope that the off day tomorrow does not cool him off.

Schilling shares the honor by going 7 strong innings allowing only 1 run on a Catalanotto home run on a 2 - 1 pitch in the 1st. Schilling set down the last ten batters he faced in a row. Most notable of these 10 was the lead off at bat in the 6th by Catalanotto. After being behind 3 - 0 to Mr. Nemesis, the next 6 pitches were for strikes with the end result of a fly out to J.D. Drew. The next two batters were retired on 5 pitches. In my opinion the ability to come back from 3 - 0 in a tight ball game was just huge. On my notepad I gave Schilling 5 stars. He followed that inning with an 8 pitch inning in the 7th.

Papelbon also gets equal billing due to his ability to come in with runners on 1st and 3rd with only 1 out and the score at 3 to 2. He then strikes out Young on 4 pitches and gets Teixeira to pop out to Lowell preserving the 1 run lead on only 5 pitches. With the off day tomorrow this allowed Tito to trot him out in the 9th were he got Sosa to pop up to Youkilis on the 2nd pitch, struck out Blalock on 5 pitches and blew Wilkerson away on 3 pitches.

Freaking outstanding and a good way to end the road trip.

Other idle thoughts. should have been 16 in a row by Schilling. From the last out in the 3rd the only man to reach was Blalock in the 4th. After Schilling had him at 1 - 2 in the count his 4th pitch looked like a strike only for the umpire to say ball 2, the next pitch Blalock hit a foul ball down the left field line that just fell in between Ramirez, Lowell and Lugo. If any one of those three had been able to reach that foul ball then he wouldn't have had a chance to hit the next pitch into left field for a single.

Almost Goat of the game was Pineiro for walking the first 2 batters he faced and allowing a bunt single on 14 pitches. He can thank Lopez and Papelbon for saving him from the horns.

Nice running catch by Coco in the 3rd leading to an inning ending double play. At the plate it looked like Coco was feeling more comfortable also, which can only lead to better things in the future. I still say he should be batting 2nd in this line up though.

I also charted during the game the first 3 pitches for each batter that Schilling faced. By my count he had 1 K on three pitches, struck out 3 batters when the count was 1 and 2 ( 7 instances with all outs except for a single in the 4th) and with the count 2 and 1 he gave up the home run, a single, a walk but recorded 1 k and had three other outs. The only time he went 3 and 0 he got Catalanotto to fly out to Drew. All in all a good game by # 38.