Lester Shuts Down Yankees In Easy Win (59-62)

Lester lowered his ERA to 5.03

It's always nice to beat the Yankees, and especially when it's a relatively easy and stress free win powered by strong starting pitching and decent offense. The Red Sox got all of that in a nice win in the middle game of this weekend's series in New York. The Red Sox bats got off to a quick start off Yankees' rookie David Phelps, putting Carl Crawford at second base with two outs in the first. Adrian Gonzalez came up and promptly powered a low and away fastball to the opposite field for a two-run homer to make it 2-0. It took them a few innings, but the Yankees finally benefitted from a home run of their own in the fourth inning. That was when Curtis Granderson took advantage of a two-out two-strike mistake fastball by Jon Lester, left up and over the plate, pounding it into the bleachers in center field.

Gonzalez had a two-run homer

Luckily, the Red Sox got that run right back in the top of the fifth-- putting Pedro Ciriaco on first base with one out. An unusual suspect in Nick Punto got the RBI here, driving a liner into the corner in right field. Right fielder Andruw Jones bobbled the ball which allowed Punto to coast into the third after making it 3-1. After that, both starting pitchers really settled down and pitched great ball games. David Phelps (3-3, 2.53) actually put up the longest start of his young career-- going 6.2 innings and allowing 3 runs on 7 hits while striking out 7 in the game. However, he would get the loss due to the fine work done on the other side of the ball by Jon Lester-- who allowed a run on 5 hits in 7 innings. The Red Sox got an insurance run on a wild pitch in the ninth, but they coasted Lester's fine start to a 4-1 win.

Bright Spots:
Jon Lester- 7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 4 K, W (7-10)
Alfredo Aceves- 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 K, SV (25)
Adrian Gonzalez- 1-3, 1 R, 1 BB, 1 HR, 2 RBI
Pedro Ciriaco- 4-4, 1 R, 1 2B
Nick Punto- 1-3, 1 BB, 1 2B, 1 RBI

Dull Spots:
Jacoby Ellsbury- 0-5, 1 K, 4 LOB
Cody Ross- 0-4, 4 K, 3 LOB
Ryan Lavarnway- 0-4, 1 K, 3 LOB

Player of the Game:
Jon Lester- The Red Sox really took advantage of a great start here today by Jon Lester, who went seven strong innings to earn the win-- he is now 7-10, 5.03.