Kuzul

Orioles southpaw Brian Matusz pitched shutout ball for seven innings at Fenway Park this afternoon, leading the Baltimore Orioles to a rare win in Boston, beating the Red Sox, 6-1. He held the Red Sox to two hits — one each in the third and fourth innings — while walking three and striking out seven in earning his first win since April 18th. He had lost his last nine decisions.

It was the 13th time in 17 starts Matusz has held an opponent to three runs or less, yet his record is a dismal 3-9. The problem has been his run support — his teammates have scored only one run or were shut out in eight of his starts.

Orioles interim manager Juan Samuel said: “He’s probably been one of our most consistent guys. We haven’t been able to score runs for him, but he’s been able to take us deep into games, with us not playing well behind him, with us not getting base hits, so it was very nice to see us score some runs for him today.”

They didn’t score many for him today off Red Sox starter John Lackey, but they scored enough. Lackey and Matusz took a 2-0 game into the eighth inning, but the O’s scored two runs in the eighth and two more in the ninth to put the game out of reach. Lackey gave up four runs (three earned) on eight hits in 7.1 innings. He walked one and struck out seven.

Of Lackey’s outing, Red Sox manager Terry Francona said: “I thought today was the best stuff he’s had all year.”

The Orioles broke a scoreless tie with two runs in the fourth inning against Lackey. Nick Markakis doubled, advanced on Ty Wigginton’s bouncer to second and scored on a wild pitch. Scott Moore added an RBI single.

Baltimore chased Lackey with two runs in the eighth inning. Miguel Tejada led off with a double and advanced to third base on a single by Markakis. He then scored on Wigginton’s bouncer to shortstop, which should have been a double play. But Marco Scutaro looked toward home plate for a force out, ending any chance of a double play, and then bounced the throw to first base. Wigginton reached on the throwing error and Markakis moved to third base. Adam Jones hit a sacrifice fly to make it 4-0, and Lackey was replaced by lefty Dustin Richardson. The O’s added two runs in the ninth inning off Scott Atchison.

Kevin Youkilis homered for the Red Sox in the bottom of the ninth inning to avoid the shutout.

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The Red Sox began the day with a chance to move into first place in the AL East, but fell 1½ games back after New York beat Toronto, 7-6, in 10 innings.

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Francona said Clay Buchholz won’t make a start on Monday or Tuesday night in Tampa. Originally, he was pushed back after straining his left hamstring last weekend in San Francisco. He’s been throwing and running without any trouble, but the Red Sox want to be cautious — they aren’t going to take any chances heading into the second half of the season. Francona said: “I think what worries us is the unexpected moves that happen in a game.” He also said the club may put him on the disabled list.

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Daisuke Matsuzaka will face the Rays tomorrow night and Tim Wakefield is scheduled for Wednesday… that leaves the team needing a starting pitcher for Tuesday. Felix Doubrant will likely be recalled for an impromptu start.

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The Red Sox may have finally found the formula for letting John Lackey settle in on Friday evening: Put up a 10-spot in the first inning.

All kidding aside, though, Lackey has struggled to assimilate to the Red Sox pitching staff, be it because of nerves, traditional slow starts, or whatever.

But the fact of the matter is, he hasn’t exactly lived up to the hype— or contract—thus far, and has been no better than the third best pitcher on the staff behind Jon Lester and Clay Buchholz, neither of whom are in Lackey’s salary neighborhood.

But one has to imagine that Lackey will find the touch before too long. He has a more than respectable pedigree and has proven so formidable in big-game situations that the Angels tossed him out there to start Game Seven of the World Series when Lackey was just a rookie.

But Lackey’s struggles are part of what makes this such a bizarre season so far. The Red Sox have escaped a brutal start and crawled back into playoff contention all without receiving anything close to a major contribution from two of the three pitchers slated for the top of the rotation.

Josh Beckett battled wildness for more than a month before being shelved with an injury that threatens to keep him out for another flip of the calendar. And Lackey is toting an uncharacteristic 4.54 ERA through 13 starts.

If someone told me we’d be in mid-June with little or nothing of consequence from those two guys, I’d have been thinking, “When does hockey start?”

And that’s the encouraging thing. For all the troubles the Red Sox went through in April and early May—and the list is frustratingly long—things are hardly dire. Consider that Boston has climbed to nine games over .500 and only four behind the Rays essentially without the services of Jacoby Ellsbury or Josh Beckett and with sub-par performances from Lackey and, for at least a month-and-a-half, David Ortiz.

Of course, such is life in Major League Baseball. Rarely if ever do all 25 guys fire on all cylinders at the same time, and it’s the nature of good teams to have role players step up while the others find their way. In that sense, the Red Sox are not re-inventing the wheel.

But they have to feel confident knowing that after the All-Star Break, they’ll presumably have a healthy Ellsbury and Beckett. And Lackey will no doubt have found his way by then.

The rest alone could be key for Beckett, who has historically benefited from extra days off en route to the postseason, where he’s done his most memorable damage.

So while Lackey continues to struggle to live up to his contract and off-season hype, the time for official panic has not yet arrived.

In fact, given where the Sox are and what they’ve dealt with, perhaps the outlook is rosier than we all think.

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Another day, another big time prospect comes to the majors.  Today it is Carlos Santana of the Cleveland Indians who was perhaps the best hitting prospect left down in the farm.  I wont start gushing too much about him, you will have to read the article to see the rest.  There is some injury news on one of the best players in the game, and also some of the more interesting pitchers of the night. 

Carlos Santana was FINALLY called to the major leagues by the Cleveland Indians and was third in the batting order in his first game.  He was 0-for-3 with a walk in his first action, but there is no doubt that the team has nothing but confidence in him and he will be their everyday catcher or at least DH if they think he needs a day off from behind the plate. 

There is absolutely nothing not to like about this kid.  He is just 24 years old and has hit at every level of the minors.  In 57 games in AAA in 2010, Santana was hitting .316 with 13 homers and 51 RBI. 

I think that he will have similar numbers to that of Buster Posey, but I think that he is going to hit more homers than his National League counterpart.  Santana is a good pick-up for any fantasy team, even if you have one of the top catchers in the league. 

The “groin injury” that caused Alex Rodriguez to come out of yesterday’s game turns out to be a hip problem after all, although according to his manager it is not in the area that caused him to have surgery and miss the first month of last season (although I don’t believe that for one second). 

He did not play on Friday and the team says that he is day to day.  If I had to guess, I would say that he probably won’t play until Sunday, but I wouldn’t be totally shocked if he was back with the team on Saturday.  It might cause him to miss some games sporadically over the next couple of weeks, but it appears that this won’t be  major. 

Austin Kearns is having a nice little bounce back year as he attempts to actually have a season that he can actually stay healthy.  Kearns has only played more than 90 games once in the last five seasons.  He had two home runs on Friday, bringing his season total to seven in just 40 games. 

If you are considering adding Kearns, allow me to offer these words of advice.  I can see you adding him to your roster if you are a little weak in the due to injury or other factors.  However, just know that this is probably going to be short lived because he has never proven to be consistent or able to stay on the field. 

For those of you who have been worried about Francisco Liriano regressing after his hot start, how are you feeling now? 

Liriano absolutely dominated the Atlanta Braves on Friday as he gave up just one run over eight innings and struck out a very impressive 11 batters.

This is now back to back games in which he has double digit strikeouts and has allowed only one run, so any concern coming off that little rough stretch should be gone.  His ERA is under 3.00 and he has more than a strikeout an inning for the season. 

R. A. Dickey got his fourth win in just five starts for the New York Mets, but I don’t see any way that you can possibly trust this journeyman knuckleballer to be a consistent contributor for you.  There is no way that you can take away today’s performance though as he allowed just one run over seven innings and struck out eight. 

Most of the time with knuckleballers it is either feast or famine.  Either the ball is jumping all over and it is hard to hit, or it just isn’t moving much at all and it is batting practice for the offense.  So far, so good for Dickey, but I think you are grasping at straws if you are expecting a 35 year old pitcher with a career record under .500 and a ERA of 5.31 to pitch well throughout the season. 

Granted it is easier to pitch when your team gives you nine runs of support in the first two innings, John Lackey had a strong outing today regardless of his cushion.  He gave up just two runs over seven innings and struck out three. 

Like I wrote last time he took the mound, I think the days of the John Lackey in Anaheim with the good strikeout numbers might be gone, but I still think he is a very viable fantasy pitcher.  He has gone from a possible staff ace to a very solid third starter on your team; but on the Red Sox he should really be able to pile up some wins as he got number seven on Friday.  It has been an uncharacteristic season for Lackey, but perhaps he can get back on track. 

Speaking of getting back on track, hopefully tonight’s game will do just that for David Ortiz .  Big Papi was starting to turn back into a pumpkin again as he had just one hit in his previous eight games—but he broke out big time on Friday as he collected three hits and drove in four runs to bring his season total to 39 RBI.  Looks like it is going to be similar to last year for Papi with a good number of homers and RBIs and a pretty putrid batting average. 

James Shields has hit a major bump in the road lately, a bump that hopefully is temporary.  He had a streak from April 22^nd to May 25^th in which he did not allow more than three earned runs, and now two of his last three outings he has coughed up at least seven.  He gave up a whopping ten earned runs on Friday in just 3.1 innings, but at least he struck out four (like that is any consolation to his owners!).

At least Shields is still getting exceptional strikeout numbers for his career, as he now has 82 whiffs in just 85 innings pitched, which is well above his career rate.  If you have Shields, you have to continue to start him no matter the opponent and hope that this is short lived. 

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Ten days ago the Red Sox suffered a crushing loss to their arch (and division rival), the New York Yankees.  Losses happen, but this one stung more than most because Jonanthan Papelbon, the team’s surefire closer over the last five seasons hardly looked like a guy who had been to All-Star games and enjoyed playoff success.

He gave up an astounding four runs in just two thirds of an inning.  For the first time in his career as a reliever he gave up two home runs in one inning and left Red Sox fans wondering if 2010 just wasn’t their year.

Why were fans so concerned in mid-May with just about 3/4 of the season left?

Simple.

The Red Sox were looking up in the standings at everyone in the division, and the Rays and Yankees both already had significant leads in the win/loss columns.  The Sox had a team that was supposed to be built on pitching and defense, and early returns were beyond disappointing in both areas. 

With John Lackey, Josh Beckett, and Diasuke Matsuzaka each struggling mightily and the defense seeming to kick one ball after another since the team flew north from Ft. Myers, the team showed no signs of a turnaround in the near future.

The next day something changed in a big way. The Red Sox appeared headed for another loss at the hand of the Bronx Bombers following a seven-inning, one-run performance from CC Sabathia.  Flame-throwing set-up man Joba Chamberlain came on and absolutely collapsed.  He gave up four runs in his inning of work and left with the score tied.

When Mariano Rivera came on for the ninth, winning the game in extra-innings seemed like the most realistic option for getting out of New York with at least one victory.  They instead managed to get the future Hall-of-Famer, plating two runs and putting the pressure back on the World Champions.

Papelbon came back through the bullpen doors, and though he looked shaky still, managed to finish the win for the former Boston Americans. 

Fast-forward eight more days and the tune is entirely different in Boston.  Since that incredible come from behind win over the Yankees, the Red Sox are an impressive 7-1 over that stretch.  More impressively, those wins have come against the Twins, Phillies, and Rays; all teams currently leading their divisions.

So just how did a team that looked like they had essentially eliminated themselves turn around their season in a little more than a week?

The team started playing like analysts had predicted in the offseason. 

Clay Buccholz and Jon Lester both ratcheted up their performances, and are currently battling for the team lead in ERA in the low 3s. 

The other members of the staff (excluding Beckett who hit the DL) have all started performing more like the top two guys than AAA pitchers. 

Matsuzaka flirted with history as he carried a no-hitter into the eighth before a flair found its way past an outstretched Marco Scutaro’s glove.  Wakefield did an admirable job filling in for Beckett as he provided the Sox with eight shut-out innings and beat Roy Halladay.  Lackey found his touch and made a quality start in the team’s win over the Rays.

The pitching staff is not solely responsible for the light-speed like turnaround. 

David Ortiz struggled more than any hitter on the team for the first month of the season.  His numbers so far in May are among the best of his career as he is hitting .368 with 9 homers this month. 

The team is also starting to get healthy as both Jacoby Ellsbury and Mike Cameron hit the field for the first time in almost a month this week.  Other hitters are starting to hit, and the plays are being made in the field.

All of this adds up to a message that the Red Sox have sent loud and clear over the the last nine days by going 8-1 overall against four of the MLB’s top six teams: It’s only May, but it might be time to start to panic about how good the team in Boston could really be.

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Caption: 3B Adrian Beltre hit a solo home run to get things started in the Red Sox 11-3 win over the Tampa Bay Rays tonight at Tropicana Field.

Maybe I should head back out of town.

During my recent sojourn to southern-most Canada (Ontario) and Chicago, the Red Sox have shaken off the doldrums that afflicted them over the first six weeks of the season. As a superstitious fan, I am nervous my return to New England will disturb whatever karma has suddenly ignited their play.

Since I departed for Windsor and Chicago, the Sox won the final game of their brief two-game series against the Yankees, swept a two-game series against the Twins, won two of three games against the Phillies in Philadelphia and—with tonight’s win in Tampa—swept a three-game series against the first-place Rays. The Olde Towne Team has won eight of their last nine games.

The sweep in Tampa answered the Rays four-game sweep against the Red Sox in Boston last month…the Sox are now a season-best six games over .500 (27-21).

This evening at “The Trop,” 3B Adrian Beltre had four hits, including two home runs, and drove in six runs as the Red Sox prevailed, 11-3, over Tampa. Beltre is batting .516 over his last eight games.

DH David Ortiz, who batted third for the first time in a year, added two hits, including his 10th home run, and raised his batting average to .266 in the process. It was his sixth homer in his last 11 games and ninth of the month.

Beltre hit a solo homer off Rays starter Matt Garza in the second inning and added a three-run shot off him in the third inning to give the Sox a 4-1 lead. Ortiz’s two-run homer in the fifth staked the club to a 6-2 advantage.

Meanwhile, RHP John Lackey allowed twelve baserunners in 6.1 IP, but he held the Rays to just two runs with clutch pitching with runners in scoring position… Tampa was just 1-for-13 with runners in scoring position against him.

The bullpen closed out the ballgame, allowing one run over 2.2 inninghs. LHP Hideki Okajima got the final two outs in the seventh. RHP Ramon Ramirez pitched a perfect eighth inning and newly-recalled righty Joe Nelson gave up a solo homer to Ben Zobrist in the ninth.

CF Jacoby Ellsbury was out of the lineup for the second straight night because of soreness in his left side.

Tampa Bay LF Carl Crawford stole second base in the fourth inning, giving him 32 straight successful steals against the Red Sox, who have not thrown him out since on Sept. 21, 2005.

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Alright, I’m finally ready to talk some baseball.

Not that I haven’t been paying attention, quite the opposite actually. Because of my line of work, I find myself watching more baseball than ever before—on Mondays and Thursdays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, not to mention the nationally televised games on Saturday and Sunday.

I see more of Buster Olney and John Kruk then I do of my own family. I even hear Tim McCarver and Joe Morgan’s voices in my dreams, which as you might guess, very quickly become nightmares.

But the real reason I haven’t talked much baseball is that I haven’t had a really good feel for my team, the Boston Red Sox.

Okay, I take that back, I do have a good feel for the Red Sox. And to quote the infamous words of former Arizona Cardinals football coach Denny Grenn, “They are who we thought they were.” To me, that was never a playoff team.

(This is just PART of Aaron’s take on the Boston Red Sox. To read this article in its ENTIRETY, please visit him at www.aarontorres-sports.com)

In my season opening podcast with my buddy Tom Finn , I made the case that I thought the Yankees would win the AL East and Tampa Bay, the wild card. When it came to the Red Sox, “pitching and defense,” was a cute mantra, with many Boston fans claiming it to be the “Moneyball,” of 2010.

Except as I contended, that’s all well and good, except, umm, you still need to score runs to win in the regular season. You need to score when Jon Lester or John Lackey has a bad outing, or when the bullpen ruins a starters good one. You can’t expect to win every game 3-1 or 2-0 or 2-1, that just isn’t reality over a 162-game season.

And although the Red Sox are scoring a reasonable amount of runs (5.21 per game), there never seems to be a rhyme or reason, or any consistency to when they’ll come. The Sox might get nine today, but then score four runs total the next three nights.

They’ll follow it up with 12 against some hopeless schmuck from Baltimore, and then go cold the following night. Watching the Red Sox, their offense really is a case of there being, “lies, damn lies, and statistics.”

It was with that semi-pessimistic (but ultimately realistic) outlook, that I headed to Fenway Park on Sunday night for the Sox-Yankees tilt. Truthfully, I was expecting the worst. And when I say the worst, I’m not just talking about the play on the field, but everything off of it too.

I live an hour and change from Boston, but in this technological world we live, get as much information as anyone actually living on Yawkey Way. The early returns weren’t so good.

From what my friends were telling me, things weren’t pretty in Boston when it came to the Red Sox.

I heard that fans and the media were had turned on certain under-performing players (cough…David Ortiz…cough), and were relentless in their hounding of manager Terry Francona; that some people were already giving up; that tickets to Sox games—arguably the toughest non-NFL ticket in professional sports—were flooding the market, the way you might find a bunch of available copies of Catcher in the Rye at a used book store.

It was with this trepidation that I headed up to Boston Sunday night. For the first time in recent memory, I wasn’t sure to expect.

After all that anxiousness, I’ve got to be honest. I was surprised by what I found. In a good way…

(To read the REMAINDER of Aaron’s article, including his take on Sunday’s big victory over the Yankees, please click here , or visit him at www.aarontorres-sports.com .

Also, for his thoughts on all things sports, make sure to follow him on Twitter @Aaron_Torres )

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As the old saying goes: “You can’t win the World Series in April, but you sure can lose it.”

Sadly, this looks to be the case for the struggling Red Sox—possessors of one of the MLB’s highest payrolls. Their struggles are due in large part to a fragile relationship between a developmentally-minded front office and a rabid fan base desperate for big-name players and marquee deals.

When done correctly, a developmentally-oriented system can lead to great results—enter the Red Sox of 2007, whose mixture of young talent and big-name stars led to World Series glory.

Unfortunately for the Sox, World Series glory will have to wait another year.

The long term deals given to Daisuke Matsuzaka, David Ortiz, J.D. Drew, and Josh Beckett have left the BoSox with four players for whom the only thing higher than their profile is their salary. All four of these marquee athletes look like shadows of their former selves and are a burden on the balance sheet, as well as the field.

The fact is that Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein dreams of running an organization similar to the Rays or Athletics of the Moneyball Era. Epstein stresses prospect development and often shies away from large free agent signings.

On the other hand, the fan base in Boston pressures the team to sign big-name players in order to justify skyrocketing ticket prices.

Believe it or not, Red Sox fans want the organization to spend like the Yankees while maintaining an identity of development like the Rays.

A brief look at recent history lends itself to the revelations that A-Rod almost signed with Boston, that the Yankees investment in C.C. Sabathia could have been matched by the Red Sox offer to Roy Halladay if a trade had been worked out, and that the Red Sox were angered not by the size of Mark Teixeira’s contract, but by the fact that they were never given the opportunity to match it.

The Red Sox’ and Yankees’ payrolls are so similar because the organizations are similar. Boston is not the Mecca of homegrown talent, as some fans would have you believe, but is as much of a haven for overpriced free agents as New York (see: John Lackey and Victor Martinez).

The problem is that while the Yankees will shamelessly spend a quarter of a billion dollars in one offseason to provide the tangible benefit that is a World Series—the Red Sox simply will not. They will still hang on to their developmental mentality and thus avoid the big money, but sure-thing free agent opportunities.

When was the last time the Red Sox signed a “sure-thing” free agent?

For the Yankees, C.C. Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and A-Rod immediately come to mind. The Red Sox, on the other hand, leave us pondering the day when Matsuzaka and Drew live up to the hype.

Ironically enough, Boston has made recent major acquisitions through blockbuster deadline deals (see: Bay and Martinez) which have shipped out some of Epstein’s most beloved prospects.

As past seasons have shown, this formula is no longer working. Maybe the pre-Epstein era duo of David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez made the young executive’s team overachieve its way to two World Series titles.

However, even the Josh Beckett deal—which many people credit for the 2007 World Series victory—involved losing Hanley Ramirez, one of baseball’s emerging superstars.

Again, big-name players at the price of a diminishing farm system.

Meanwhile, the real measure of success in Boston has changed from playoff appearances to World Series victories.

While the outlook may be bleak in baseball’s most top-heavy division, the Red Sox have an undeniably talented nucleus of young players.

Jon Lester, Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, and Victor Martinez are here to stay—and with the impressive play of the Rays and Yanks, the BoSox will need all the help they can buy…or develop that is.

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Since the conclusion of the 2009 season, I’ve frequently been seen plastering the Bleacher Report’s proverbial walls with my 2010 MLB predictions, some reasonable and some outlandish.

Well, most are outlandish.

Here’s a review of my predictions, an update on the reality set against my fantasy, and a grade of my performance.

Please feel free to tell me I’m full of it when you see an outrageous prediction with early success, but don’t forget to pick me up when you see me suffering an early reality check.

All in all, I judge myself to be 7-5-4. Hey, that’s a winning record.

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