Red Sox 2008 Game 81 Recap

Final

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Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Arizona	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0		0	3	0
Boston	0	1	0	0	0	1	0	3	-		5	12	0

W: T. Wakefield (5-5) L: R. Johnson (4-6) S: J. Papelbon (23)
HR ➢ Bos: K. Cash (1)

✫ 1st star - Wakefield - 7 Innings of 2 hit ball
✫✫ 2nd star - Cash - His three run home run off of cruz in the 8th sealed the deal
✫✫✫ 3rd star - Moss - His 0 for 3 accounted for the early lead as he scored Lowell twice.
⋔ Pitchfork - Consistency - Would love to see a game where one of the relievers has back to back good outings.

Game thoughts!

Wakefields knuckle ball was knuckling and Johnson was being good enough to make you bite your nails. In the first six innings the Sox were only able to score two runs off of Johnson even though they had 8 hits and 2 walks off of him. Both of those runs were driven in by Moss, 1 on a ground out, the second on a sacrifice fly.

With Wakefield mixing in his curve ball and fast ball effectively he was just a little bit better than Johnson. Ok, he was a lot better than Johnson, but after six innings the Sox were only up by those two runs.

Of course Wakefield is used to that but it was nice to see the eight inning start off with a walk by Lowell and then for the second straight time and third over all, Crisp hit a double putting runners on second and third. This time instead of scoring the run with an out, Cash sent one way over the monster seat. A huge sigh of relief was heard in my house and I naturally just assumed that this game was toast.

In fact I was thinking, Hansen comes in and gets 1-2-3 inning and everybody is happy. Just not meant to be though.

Hansen immediately made the game exciting again as he walked the first batter, got two outs and then allowed an infield single and another walk to load the bases. Instead of Papelbon getting two days of rest, Francona had to bring him in with the bases loaded. This being the bot though, he struck out Tracy on five pitches. The water was dirty.

Factoid - For June the Sox are batting .276 / .356 / .474 overall and a horrendous .267 / .357 / .453 at home. That is how you have a 3 and 3 home stand.

♊ - Then don't strain your brain trying. Might break something.