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June 15, 2007
PAWTUCKET – Being the competitor that he is, Jon Lester doesn’t consider anything short of a win to be acceptable.
``We had the loss, so that’s the main thing,’’ the 23-year-old southpaw said following the Pawtucket Red Sox’ 3-0 setback to the Richmond Braves last night at McCoy Stadium which snapped their four-game winning streak. ``I’m not out there to pitch seven innings, give up two runs and not get the ‘W.’ So if we win, then that’s a good start. If we don’t, then it’s not.’’
With that said, Lester says he did come off the mound last night feeling considerably better about his eighth rehab start for the PawSox than he did following his previous outing last Saturday against Ottawa when he lasted just 2-2/3 innings after giving up three runs on five hits.
In comparison, he went seven innings last night against the Southern Division-leading Braves, scattering eight hits and giving up two earned runs.
``Command-wise, it was better and stuff-wise it wasn’t any different,’’ said Lester, who threw 61 of his 93 pitches for strikes, recording three strikeouts and two walks. ``I think I had better stuff the other night, but I’m just I glad threw seven and yeah, it was a better night.’’
PawSox manager Ron Johnson was far less critical of Lester’s performance.
``I thought it was pretty good,’’ he said. ``I mean, seven innings, two runs. We’ll take that every time he takes the ball. That’s a good start. Jon gave us more than ample opportunity to win the ballgame. I’m just really pleased to see the way he rebounded from his last start. I know he probably felt we shut him down in the last one – he went 2-2/3 – and to see him come back seven innings against the team with the best record in the league, or real close to it, I thought was very impressive.’’
With no restrictions placed upon him other than a maximum pitch count of 100, Lester retired three out of four batters in each of the first two innings before giving up two runs in the third.
Braves third baseman Wes Timmons led off with a single up the middle, moved to second on a sac bunt by Gregor Blanco, then scored from second on Martin Prado’s single to left.
Brayan Pena singled to right, advancing Prado to third. Prado then scored on Graham Koonce’s sac fly to right, although he was nearly thrown out at the plate by PawSox rightfielder David Murphy.
Relieving Lester in the eighth, Mike Burns then gave up an RBI single to Koonce for Richmond’s only other run.
But Pawtucket was unable to get anything going at the plate against the Braves’ pitching staff, which boasts a league-best 3.25 ERA. Ryan Basner was credited with the win, improving to 2-2, while Manny Acosta earned his eighth save.
``You’ve got to tip your hat to their guys,’’ Johnson said of Richmond, which leads the International League South with a 38-27 record. ``They stymied us today. They put it to us . . . and we didn’t even really threaten. We went down (to Richmond last week) and got 3 out of 4 and we won the first one here, but you know what, you know you’re playing a very good ball club. There are reasons why they have that record. You could see it today. And there’s reasons why that pitching staff over there from a numbers standpoint is the top-ranked in the league, so you’re going to have days like that against them. We lost the ballgame, 3-0; we got two hits; they shut us down today offensively. We’ll sleep well and go out (tonight) and see what happens. But I was really pleased with Jon.’’
CAROLYN THORNTON
Posted by Thom Cahir 
at 10:38 PM to PawSox
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