Jon Lester was finally able to turn his shaky start to the season around last week. Tonight, Lester looks to lead he Boston Red Sox past the Toronto Blue Jays in the last game in the Rogers Centre.
The Boston Red Sox were able to take the first game against Toronto last night, but Shaun Marcum will head to the hill to protect his home turf, while Clay Buchholz looks to build on what's shaping up to be a good year.
In a day that saw the Red Sox add another very intriguing, young, good hitting catcher, they may also be saying goodbye to a old friend. (Click on the headline or 'read more' below.)
The Boston Red Sox will head north to Canada, kicking off week-long road stand against the Dana Eveland and the Toronto Blue Jays.
The Boston Red Sox bats were out last night in rare form. Today, the run support will have to be there in order to back up Tim Wakefield in his last start before heading out to the bullpen.
On the advanced side of the Hall of Metrics they are averaging a weighted Runs Created plus (wRC+) of 65.666 which is actually a little misleading because Lowell actually has a very decent wRC+ number of 121, albeit in only 20 official at bats this year. The average wRC+ between Ortiz and Drew is 38 (44 for Ortiz, 32 for Drew). Conversely, runs are hard to create when you are not getting on base and the mean between the three players weighted on-base average is .281 again with Lowell skewing the numbers with a .361 wOBA while Ortiz and Drew are at .251 and .233, respectively.
Outfielder Ryan Kalish fell so far below the proverbial Mendoza Line shortly after he was promoted to Portland last season that he was virtually invisible. Kalish began the season at high-A Salem and literally hit his way into a promotion to the Sea Dogs. In 32 games with Salem, Kalish hit .304 with five home runs, 21 RBI, a .434 OBP and seven stolen bases in 10 attempts. But in his first 21 at-bats with Portland, Kalish managed just one hit – repeat, one – which translated into a .048 batting average.
“Honestly, it was a total mental adjustment that I had to make,” said Kalish who turned 22 on March 28 but was the youngest player on Portland at the time of his promotion. “When I got there, I wanted to do too much. I was putting pressure on myself and was saying ‘In this at-bat I really, really need to get a hit.’ That’s the hardest way to play the game – by putting pressure on yourself.”
The Boston Red Sox were able to clip the Orioles wings last night. Tonight, John Lackey looks to add his second win of the season to the team's total.
Even though most thought the Red Sox offense would suffer (I took a slightly different view), the other side of the ledger would make up for the drop off so professed the optimists of the media and the Nation. Run prevention -- pitching and defense -- was supposed to the strength of the Local Nine. Through April 22nd, the defense has been strong even with Jacoby Ellsbury and Mike Cameron missing multiple game. The Sox are second in Ultimate Zone Rating and eighth in Defense Efficiency. Hence, the biggest disappointment has been the pitchers and specifically, the top three starters.