Most baseball analysts think Jon Lester will emerge as one of the best pitchers in the league this year.
His start yesterday against the Tampa Bay Rays took a sharp left turn. And it wasn’t in the right direction.
Lester was rocked for five runs including a two-run shot by Carlos Pena in just five innings pitched. Lester suffered his first loss of the season and first against Tampa Bay in his career (4-1).
Pena who struck out five straight times to start the season launched a two-run homer in the fifth inning giving the Rays a comfortable 5-1 lead.
Grant Balfour closed the door in the ninth, a 1-2-3 inning, for his first save of the season.
Goat of the Game – Lester
Lester was far from sharp in his first outing yielding eight hits in just five innings pitched with two walks to his credit as well.
The loss also snapped Lester’s 16-game regular-season unbeaten streak at home. He last lost at home in the regular-season against the Detroit Tigers on April 9.
Next Game – Thurs. 4/09 vs. Tampa Bay Rays – Daisuke Matsuzaka/Matt Garza
Dice-K, in his career, is 2-3 against the Rays with a 3.75 ERA (20 ER, 48.0 IP) in eight games started against Tampa Bay.
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Look, Lester wasn’t “sharp”, at the same time, he made the pitches he needed to make to get out of the inning in the 5th (aside from the Pena HR). He got the flair that happened to drop behind third and induced the double play from Longoria. I wouldn’t be too far down on Lester in this outing. But it certainly wasn’t his best.
Ugh, not much positive to say about that one. Had nifty seats (for 12 bucks) right up against the bleacher wall between the two CF scoreboards. But the temp quickly plummeted after the start of the game, and the wind around the lower bowl was not kind.
I hated seeing old Lester out there, along with complete ineptitude from our offense. Just not a good game all around.
And as Chris C. said, they’ve definitely reduced the size of drink cups. But, on the plus side, they’ve added a proper railing (with shelf!) behind the plate for SRO people, which is going to completely change the way I see games. A truly wonderful addition, one of those under-the-radar unadvertised changes that makes all the difference, especially if you ever had to half-lean on those police barricade things previously.