We went into Boston feeling good about the team in general, but still feeling crappy based on the way we limped into the All-Star break. The less said about the last series the better, but even given the shame of that, one still felt good going into Boston.
You felt a whole lot better very quickly once this game got started. While Elvis Andrus fell victim to a good knuckleball, that’s about where it ended. The immediate aftermath after Elvis was single, single, single (run), double (run), single (two runs), home run (two runs), and then the last two outs were made. We roughed up Tim Wakefield pretty good, slapping a six spot on him in the top of the first. He calmed down a bit in the second, getting the Rangers 1-2-3, but no so much in the third. THere was a single, an error, and a double, which scored the seventh Ranger run, leaving men on second and third with nobody out. The total rout was on!
However, that’s where our scoring ended. Second and third, nobody out, and we didn’t score any more. There were a few other opportunities to score as well, and truth be told, we probably should have scored about 12-15 runs total. I’ll take the 7 and the win for sure, but it could have/should have been a lot more than that.
The home run came from Bengie Molina, which seemed to surprise me. I know he’s had some pop in his time in San Francisco, but still. He seemed to be batting like all the other guys we’ve had at catcher this season so far. So the home run surprised me.
Tommy Hunter went to 6-0 after getting this win. He had a good game, going 6.2 innings, allowing just two runs on five hits. However, most of those hits didn’t mean anything, since the two runs the Sox got were both solo home runs (Drew, Hall). Hunter came out with 108 pitches thrown. Darren Oliver & Alexi Ogando (who has been looking nice in the pen) cleaned up, and held down the fort.
It was a great way to start this rather important road trip. As I told NESN, it wasn’t so much that we needed to beat the “Red Sox”, we just needed to win this series, given the Angels are playing a team they should beat. So yeah, the win was a good one for us, plus it erased the memory of Baltimore mostly. And speaking to the “Red Sox”, it’s nice to win in Fenway fairly decisively, as we have had problems in Boston the last few years.