Opening Day Redux: Red Sox 2 - A's 1
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
As I expected, the first two days of the 2008 season have been filled with innings, stats, highlights, and articles read: Busy is not a big enough word. I did manage to clear my schedule to watch the Red Sox squeeze past the Athletics by a score of 2-1. Mostly what I had to "reschedule" was sleep, as the game started at 10:05 in my EST village.The games should have left most Sox fans as it left me; a bit more relaxed. Matsuzaka looked like we all think he should, with 9 k's, 2 hits, no walks, and 1 run over 6 1/3. Okajima came in and managed to hold the fort, giving up only a single walk before being relieved by Paps with on out left in the 8th. Papelbon, the other source of bad nerves after two shaky appearances last week, looked worlds better, making short work of that last 8th inning out, then striking out the side in the bottom of the ninth.
The plate is still a spot where we all hope things liven up a bit. Papi is still hitless, and we did only manage 2 runs, but that should have been three. Jason Varitek was robbed of a homer in the 6th when his shot clearly hit the yellow above the A's out-of-town scoreboard. According to the announcers, no ump (meaning the first base ump) made any moves to position himself better to see the ball. In the end (some debate by Francona not withstanding) Tek was awarded the double, but Youkilis had scored from third (he scored both Red Sox runs, by the way) to take the lead.
This afternoon, we finish what feels like a marathon against the A's with a rematch of last week's Lester vs. Harden match-up. Let's hope Lester can get things straight so we can head to Toronto atop the AL East at 3-1.
