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Baseball Today: Thursday, May 31 »
May 30, 2007
BOSTON — For the first time this week, the Boston Red Sox didn’t receive a sterling effort from a starting pitcher. Yet, at this point of the season, that doesn’t seem to matter very much.
The Red Sox have the final day of May off to rest, play golf or pick up their children from school. They also have reason to celebrate with a whopping 11½-game lead in the American League East in their back pockets. The two months of work spent accumulating that advantage gives the Sox room to dismiss a very shaky outing like the one Daisuke Matsuzaka turned in last night in a 8-4 loss to the Cleveland Indians.
Dice-K didn’t resemble the rookie flash that’s baffled several opponents with a vast array of offerings so far this season. He was rocked for 12 hits and six runs over just 52/3 innings, easily his shakiest outing of the season. The Indians did most of their damage in the fifth and sixth innings when they hit up Matsuzaka for six runs on eight hits with several of his pitches being scalded.
Instead of keeping the Indians guessing as to which pitch he’d throw next, Matsuzaka seemed to rely on his fastball a bit too much and left too many off-speed pitches — like the fat slider Grady Sizemore crushed over the bullpen wall in right for a 2-run homer in the sixth — out over the plate.
Boston’s bullpen wasn’t much better. Cleveland pounded out a season-high 18 hits and showed why they’ll be a factor all season long in the A.L. Central.
Now the Red Sox have a chance to begin the third month of the season by supplying another deadly blow to their arch-enemies from New York. The Yankees come to town for a weekend series that some are billing as a potential burial for the boys from Gotham. Indeed, it could be.
The Yanks snapped a five-game nosedive with a 10-5 win last night in Toronto that cut their deficit in the A.L. East to 13½ games. A Red Sox sweep this weekend would bury the Yanks in a 16½-game hole. The flip side is a Yankee sweep would cut the lead to 10½ and give Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and the newest addition to the pitching staff, Roger Clemens, reason to hope over the next few months.
New York also has today off and will come to Fenway Park with their its three top pitchers — Chien-Ming Wang, Mike Mussina and Andy Pettitte — ready to throw. Boston counters with Tim Wakefield, Curt Schilling and Josh Beckett, who are a combined 18-7.
However the weekend ends up, the Red Sox clearly have reason to hold all the confidence in the world. Despite Matsuzaka’s shaky outing last night, the team’s starting pitching has been excellent. The deep and talented lineup has racked up the third-most runs in the American League, even with big bopper Manny Ramirez off to a less-than-stellar start. The bullpen has been better than solid, too, with Jonathan Papelbon throwing well and lefty setup man Hideki Okajima emerging as one of the biggest surprises in baseball.
Boston has dominated series against the three teams with the next-best records in the American League (Angels, Indians and Tigers) by a combined 8-2 record.
But lost amid all the glee over the fast start and the fat lead over the Yankees is the fact that the Red Sox’ goal is not to beat New York and win the A.L. East title for the first time since 1995. It’s to win the World Series.
Cruising to a 10-game division win over the Yankees would be a great achievement but it means nothing if the Sox lose to Cleveland in the A.L. Division Series. Boston is off to an historic start over the season’s first two months and the 14½ game lead over the Yankees was accumulated so quickly, and stunningly, that fans certainly have grown giddy.
Now it’s time to see if the next few months can come off just as sweet.
--KEVIN McNAMARA
Posted by Chris Venditto 
at 11:16 PM | Permalink
