Dice-5K (and no Walks)
Before the Red Sox game today, on very little sleep (after being blown out last night), Jim Leyland, the manager of the Tigers made a comment on Daisuke Matsuzaka. I am thinking that now, he would like to take it back. His exact words were:
“I don’t give a shit about him. I’m not getting into all that. I could give a fuck less. It’s another pitcher. We’re playing in Boston.” and “Obviously, he’s an outstanding pitcher. He’s a major league pitcher. And that’s who we’re facing.”
And the sky is blue and the game is sold out, add that too why don’t you. Right Jim, or should I call you master of the obvious. He’s just another pitcher, and you don’t need to pay any sort of special attention to him, right? And then what happens? Curtis Granderson gives you the early lead only to do nothing else all day and get blown away for a second consecutive day. Daisuke pitched great and you look like a fool.
In fact, Matsuzaka was outstanding. He didn’t walk anyone, pitched the corners of the plate nearly perfectly and threw 124 pitches for the complete game. The Tigers managed to scatter a few hits, but none came consecutively. Robertson pitched pretty well for the Tigers. His infield didn’t help him (how were neither of those botched ground balls errors by the way) and the Sox were VERY patient, chasing him after just 5 innings. That led to Bobby Seay pitching the 8th inning, where the Red Sox introduced him to what a major league lineup can do. He had a 2.45 ERA coming in to today, but has never pitched a full season in the bigs and was due to be hit. This is especially great news when you consider that Detroit had to use 4 pitchers last night as well. Wakefield is an innings eater and will be hopefully saving the bullpen tomorrow.
Overall, Daisuke and the Red Sox in general looked great tonight and clearly aren’t going to be intimidated by the fact that they are playing a current first place team for the first time this year.
Stumble it!