Friday, June 18, 2010

Fenway's Not Mannywood

Manny Ramirez returned to Fenway Park tonight, and my buddy Jere over at A Red Sox Fan From Pinstripe Territory says that the crowd was overwhelmingly cheering him while he took batting practice.

I was a Professor Thom's tonight (I was surprised very few Sox fans turned out for the game), and applauded when Manny came up in the second. It was definitely a mixed reaction at Fenway, as some fans were standing and clapping, but many were noticeably booing. My friend Matt had the game on WEEI on his iPad and it was about 30 seconds behind (which was really weird), and Joe Castiglione and Dave O'Brien went quiet while he came up. They said he was being more booed than cheered.

OK, whatever. Let's get back to baseball and leave all this crap behind, once and for all.

J.D. Drew, David Ortiz and Adrian Beltre all blasted home runs tonight, as the Sox again feasted on mediocre NL pitching. (Unfortunately, Drew left with a hamstring injury in the third inning, and a DL stint seems likely.) The Sox jumped out 3-0 in the first, in support of rookie Felix Doubront, making his MLB debut. He looked good overall, as he was economical in his pitching. He pitched 5+ innings, got the side in order three times (including the first and second). But he ran into trouble in the third, allowing three runs, aided by his own error.

But the Red Sox exploded for seven in the fifth, and Beltre hit another one of his "one-knee-on-the-ground" home runs. And it was a blast, and it landed in the parking lot across Lansdowne Street.

Doubront ran out of gas in the sixth, but the kid was mostly impressive, allowing just two earned runs. Scott Atchison (who was very good: 3 innings, no hits, 5 K), Dustin Richardson and Daniel Bard finished up the 10-6 win. And who made the last out of the game? Yep, Ramirez, as Bard got him swinging with two on.

And also ironically tonight, Papi's 15th blast of the season tied him for fifth on the all-time Red Sox home run list at 275 with: Manny Ramirez.

New York and Tampa Bay both lost yet again, so the Red Sox are now 1 game out, in third place.

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