Friday, May 11, 2007

Clicking On All Cylinders

The Red Sox swept the Blue Jays out of the Rogers Centre with a three-game whitewash this week, and an 8-0 shutout last night. They played the series against the hurting Blue Jays as good as they could have possibly played.

Tim Wakefield now leads the AL in ERA at 1.79, and pitched seven scoreless innings for the win, and his streak is at 16. The Red Sox won five out of six in Toronto and Minnesota and got quality starts in every game.

In Toronto, the dormant bat of Dustin Pedroia came alive, Mike Lowell crushed two three-run homers and Kevin Youkilis was nearly perfect at the plate. The Sox battered Toronto pitching for 26 runs, while the Red Sox gave up just five. They whacked Roy Halladay for all eight runs last night, and it is the second straight time that the former Cy Young Award winner has been hit extremely hard. It is turning into a lost season for the Blue Jays, as closer B. J. Ryan had Tommy John surgery yesterday, and will miss the remainder of the 2007 season. The Jays have now lost nine straight, and you have to figure that manager John Gibbons will take the fall for this at some point this season.

David Ortiz is hot now and hit his 8th homer last night. Manny Ramirez is now hitting .250 and his average is on the rise. But the pitching continues to be nothing short of marvelous. They allowed only 10 runs in the last six games, and have not allowed more than four runs in a road game over their last 15 games away from Fenway. That is truly remarkable.

Pitching wins championships, and the Red Sox appear to be loaded as far as arms go. It's early, just mid-May, and way too early to call any race over. But the Sox are the class of the AL as far as pitching goes.

As of now, they sure don't seem to need some guy from a southern state to come riding on a white horse to save their season.

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