The Boston Red Sox welcome the hobbling Detroit Tigers to Boston for a 3-game weekend set at Fenway Park.  While the Red Sox are getting healthier by the day, the Tigers are still trying to recover from a recent slew of injuries that have caused the Tigers to lose 13 of their last 16 games.

Jon Lester has pitched well lately (he struck out a career-high 13 Mariners in a 5-1 loss last week), but he has lost his last 2 starts.  He hopes to avoid a 3rd consecutive loss for the 1st time in his career tonight.  Overall, Lester is 11-5 with a 2.92 ERA and a 1.09 WHIP.  He is 6-2 at Fenway Park with a 2.84 ERA, but he lost his last start at Fenway despite giving up just 3 ER in 8 innings against the Texas Rangers on July 18th.

The Red Sox are 58-44 and they trail the Yankees by 7.5 games in the AL East race and the Rays by 5.5 games in the AL Wild Card race. Josh Beckett has made 2 effective starts since coming off the DL and he is looking forward to the upcoming 7-game homestand:  “The way we ended the road trip, we can take that back with us and get to where we’re comfortable.  We’ve still got more guys to get healthy, but a lot of us are coming back now.”  Let’s hope the Sox have a run in them – they certainly have a lot of work to do to catch the Yankees and Rays…

While Josh Beckett, Clay Buchholz and Victor Martinez have all come back and performed well for the Red Sox, now it’s time for Dustin Pedroia, Mike Cameron & Jacoby Ellsbury to show that they can stay healthy and be productive during the final 2 months of the season.

FYI – Beckett stands to pick up his 1st win since coming off the DL after Marco Scutaro’s Grand Slam to left field broke a 3-3 tie in the top of the 8th innings.  Yeehaw!!!  What a great way to end the 10-game road trip with a 3-game sweep of the Angels.  Beckett threw 112 pitches in 7 innings, yielding just 3 ER on 5 hits and 1 walk.  Even better, Beckett seemed to get stronger as the game went on.  He gave up 2 runs in the 2nd inning, but after giving up a lone run on a sac fly in the bottom of the 5th inning, Beckett retired the last 7 batters he faced.

John Lackey kept his former club in check for a 2nd time in 2010, and the Red Sox pushed across 4 late runs in order to pull off the 4-2 win over the Angels in Anaheim.

The Good — Lackey matched Jered Weaver pitch for pitch, giving up just 2 ER on 7 hits and 1 walk in 7 1/3 innings.  He struck out 4 while throwing a season-high 124 pitches to earn the win.  Despite a bloated 1.49 WHIP and 4.26 ERA, Lackey still has a respectable 10-5 record on the season.

The Good – Jed Lowrie and Marco Scutaro at the top of the lineup.  Lowrie had 2 hits and he gave the Red Sox their 1st lead with a 2-run double in the 7th inning.  Scutaro had 3 hits and scored twice.  Even Darnell McDonald adding some spark to the bottom of the order in the 9-hole – 2 hits, a walk and a run scored.

The Good — Adrian Beltre has been relatively quiet on the west coast road trip, but he came through with a clutch RBI double in the 8th inning to extend the Red Sox lead to 3-1.  The same could be said for David Ortiz up until his arrival in Anaheim.  Big Papi had 2 home runs in Monday night’s win and he had 2 great late-inning at-bats in last night’s win.  He walked and scored in the 8th inning on Beltre’s double and then his single in the 9th inning allowed Scutaro to score an insurance run when Howie Kendrick committed an error on the play.

The Good — Daniel Bard & Jonathan Papelbon – Manager Terry Francona used the Bard-Papelbon combo once again to preserve the win.  Bard issued a walk, but got the job done in the 8th inning.  And Papelbon worked a perfect 9th inning for his 24th save.  These guys are getting so much work this year, Francona has already indicated that he is giving both relievers the day off on Wednesday so that they will have 2 days off before the upcoming weekend series against the Detroit Tigers at Fenway Park.

Josh Beckett looks to make a 2nd good start since coming off the DL in this afternoon’s series finale.  The Red Sox currently trail 3-2 – Beckett has given up 3 ER on 5 hits and 1 walk through 5 innings.

Clay Buchholz regained his form that made him the Red Sox most formidable pitcher for most of the 2010 slate.  Buchholz racked up 115 pitches through 7 innings of 1-run ball.  He allowed just 5 hits and 1 walk and struck out 7 Angels’ hitters in his 11th win of the season.  Buchholz was pleased with his great outing especially after he struggled so much in his 1st start off the DL last week.

The Good — The Red Sox bats finally woke up as well. The stroked 11 hits and event though they only had 1 walk, they still managed to push across 6 runs.  David Ortiz led the way with 2 home runs and 3 RBI’s.  His solo home run in the 3rd inning gave the Red Sox the lead for good at 2-1.  His 2-run shot in the 8th inning gave the Red Sox some cushion which they desperately needed after losing 2 close ball games against the Mariners in Seattle over the weekend.  Victor Martinez also returned to the Red Sox lineup for the 1st time since being on the DL.  He made his 1 hit count as it plated Adrian Beltre with the tying run in the 2nd inning.  Beltre had 2 hits and a run scored, while Kevin Youkilis had 3 hits and a run scored.

Stat You May Have Missed — Jonathan Papelbon worked an inning and a 1/3 to pick up his 23rd save of the season.  Manager Tery Francona called upon Papelbon in the 8th inning immediately after Scott Atchison gave up a 2-run HR to Hideki Matsui that cut the Red Sox lead to 4-3.  It was huge that the Red Sox got 2 more runs in the top of the 9th inning on J.D. Drew’s double to give Papelbon a little more cushion with a 6-3 lead instead of a 4-3 lead.

The Yankees and Rays both won as well, so the Red Sox did not pick up any ground.  John Lackey looks to make it 3 good starts in a row.  Lackey shut down his former team back on May 5th at Fenway Park with 7 innings of 1-run ball.  He gave up just 2 hits and 2 walks in the outing and the Red Sox are hoping he can duplicate that performance tonight in Anaheim…

The Red Sox had to have liked their chances for a sweep over the Mariners this weekend in Seattle after winning the 1st 2 games of the series. They had Jon Lester pitching on Saturday and Daisuke Matsuzaka throwing on Sunday and they were confident that the 2 starters could lead the squad to the 4-game sweep and get the Red Sox back in the AL East and AL Wild card races.  As it turns out, Lester and Matsuzaka really did their parts, while the rest of the team struggled to produce.

Jon Lester was cruising along on Saturday, retiring the 1st 16 batters he faced to take a perfect game into the 6th inning.  Jack Wilson then stroked a line drive to center fielder Eric Patterson, but when Patterson closed his glove too soon, the ball glanced off of his mitt for a 2-base error.  The usually-mentally-tough Lester then served up a 2-run home run to Michael Saunders and just like that, the no-hitter and the game were gone.  Lester seemed to come unhinged after the Patterson error.  Although he worked into the 8th inning, he gave up 3 more runs in that frame as the Red Sox fell 5-1.  Despite allowing just 4 hits and 1 walk, he suffered his 5th loss of the season.  He did lower his WHIP to 1.09 and he struck out 13 Mariners’ hitters.

Meanwhile the Red Sox was mostly non-existent – only 5 hits and 2 walks.  Their lone run came on David Ortiz’s solo home run in the 4th inning.

On Sunday, it was much off the same.  Good starting pitching; poor hitting and this time, a bad bullpen. Daisuke Matsuzaka tossed 6 solid innings, allowing just a single ER on 4 hits and 5 walks.  His control wasn’t perfect, but he left the game with a 2-1 lead.  The usually-reliable Daniel Bard pitched a scoreless 7th inning to keep the Red Sox in lead, but he allowed Jose Lopez’s lead-off single in the 8th inning that started a 3-run rally.  Hideki Okajima relieved Bard after the lead-off single, and promptly allowed 5 straight hits – 2 of which were bunts.  Not good. The Mariners scored 3 runs and eventually won the game 4-2.

Once again, the Red Sox bats were quiet.  Only 7 hits and 1 walk.  For a 2nd straight game, the Red Sox scored in only 1 inning – the 4th.  Kevin Youkilis had an RBI double and Adrian Beltre had an RBI single.

Clay Buchholz looks to get himself and the Red Sox back on track tonight against the Angels in Anaheim.  He struggled in his 1st start off the DL last Wednesday, but hopes to bring his A-game against Joel Pineiro.  The Red Sox have dropped 4 of the 1st 7 games on this 10-game west coast road trip and they have fallen 8 games behind the New York Yankees in the AL East race and 5 games behind the Tampa Bay Rays in the AL Wild Card race. Ouch…

Thanks Josh – Beckett is back.  It wasn’t all pretty, but it was great to see Josh Beckett back on the mound and throwing hard.  Hopefully he’s not too sore today.

Josh Beckett threw 98 pitches in 5 2/3 effective innings.  What a pretty sight to see – never thought I could feel that way about another man?!  Sure, Jon Lester and Clay Buchholz have been amazing all year, but John Lackey and Daisuke Matsuzaka have been way too inconsistent.  We need a healthy, reliable and nasty Beckett if we are going to make a run at the Yankees and Rays, so this was a good 1st impression.  Beckett gave up 5 hits and 3 walks in his outing, but he limited the damage to just a lone 1st inning run that may have been more jitters than anything else.  He struck out 5 and seemed to settle down after the rocky 1st.

The Good — Adrian Beltre continued his solid clutch hitting with an RBI double that tied the game at 1 in the 4th inning.  Bill Hall has also been productive at the plate of late – his solo home run in the 7th inning proved to be the game-winner.  Kevin Youkilis and Mike Cameron each had 2 hits as well.

The Good — The Bullpen.  With Beckett throwing for the 1st time in 2 months, you figured the bullpen would come into play in this one.  Scott Atchison helped Beckett get out of a jam in the 6th inning and then worked a scoreless 7th inning.  He has really turned it on as of late – 1.15 WHIP & 3.79 ERA.  Daniel Bard pitched a scoreless 8th inning with 2 K’s for his 21st hold.  And Jonathan Papelbon worked a scoreless 9th inning with 2 K’s for his 22nd save – he did make it interesting though with a hit and a walk, but managed to stave off any further damage.

Jon Lester looks to make it 3 in a row over the Mariners tonight in Seattle.

I am starting to have some serious doubts about this 2010 Red Sox squad.  I can’t remember the last time a Red Sox team in recent memory blew a 5-run lead in the 9th inning.  So how did it all go so wrong?

John Lackey probably worked 8 of the best innings that he’s worked all season long.  Sure the Mariners don’t have the best offense, but Lackey allowed just 2 hits and 1 walk in his 8 innings.  In fact, he didn’t allow a hit until 2 outs in the 8th inning when Josh Bard broke up his no-no bid with a clean single to right center field.  Lackey’s lone walk to Milton Bradley back in the 2nds inning eventually came around to score on a 2-out passed ball that Kevin Cash couldn’t handle.  It was an unearned run and the only run that Lackey would allow.  With a comfortable 6-1 lead, Manager Terry Francona opted to go with Manny Delcarmen to finish off the rest of the game and give some much needed rest to the Red Sox ‘pen.  But it wasn’t meant to be.  Delcarmen quickly allowed 2 runs on a single and a home run.  That cut the lead to 6-3.  Delcarmen then walked Jose Lopez and Marco Scutaro’s error on a Milton Bradley ground ball that could have been a double play allowed 1st and 2nd with nobody out.  That brought Francona out to bring in closer Jonathan Papelbon.  Papelbon immediately recorded an out on a K, but then allowed a run-scoring double to former teammate Casey Kotchman.  With 2nd and 3rd and only 1 out with a 2-run lead, Papelbon tried to get too cute with Josh Bard and ended up walking him to load the bases.  Not great, but not the end of the world either because there was a force at any base.  Papelbon even got ahead of the #9 hitter Jack Wilson, but after fouling off 3 2-strike pitches, Wilson hit what should have been a double play ball to Scutaro.  They got the force at 2nd base, but Hall’s poor throw went well wide of Youkilis at 1st base allowing the tying run to score.  What a complete disaster – not only did Lackey lose out on his no-hit bid, he didn’t even get the win either as the Red Sox bullpen and fielders completely failed the big righty.

The Good – Clearly lackey.

The Good – The Bullpen (after Delcarmen and Papelbon screwed it all up).  Daniel Bard tossed another perfect inning; Hideki Okajima worked 2 scoreless innings and got out of a bases loaded, 1-out jam in the 12th inning by forcing 2 pop outs; and Ramon Ramirez worked a scoreless 13th inning for the save.

The Good – Marco Scutaro, Bill Hall and J.D. Drew each slugged home runs to pace a 13 hit attack. Kevin Youkilis had 3 hits, while David Ortiz and Scutaro each had 2 hits.

Stat You May Have Missed – Eric Patterson who is hitting just .208 in 41 at-bats with the Red Sox came through with the game-winning 2-run double in the 13th inning to give the Red Sox the important win.

Looking forward to seeing Josh Beckett start tonight.  Not really sure what to expect, but he has pitched pretty well in his rehab starts.  Let’s hope he fares better than Clay Buchholz did in his 1st start after he returned from the disabled list on Wednesday.  The Red Sox are going to need a healthy and focused Josh Beckett for the rest of the 2010 MLB schedule if they expect to qualify for a post-season spot in October…

Clay Buchholz clearly might have needed a rehab start or 2 before returning to the big leagues following his leg/hamstring injury.  The Red Sox squad was thrilled to get Buchholz back (in theory), but the results on the field were not so hot.  Buchholz clearly looked a little “out of sync” during his short start and he put the Red Sox in too big of a hole to climb out of in order to win the rubber game of the series.

The Bad – Buchholz needed 89 pitches to labor through just 4  innings during his 1st start since coming off the disabled list right before the All-Star Break.  Buchholz was not sharp as he issued 3 walks and served up 6 hits – 2 of which were home runs.  5 ER in 4 innings made his ERA balloon all the way up to 2.81.  Ouch.  Now I know it is just his 1st start back, but we are going to need Buchholz to bring his “A” game for the rest of the season if the Red Sox expect to make any sort of run over the next 2 months of the season.

The Good – Adrian Beltre – this guys is simply the Red Sox best hitter in 2010.  Beltre had 3 more hits including a 2-run home run in the 6th inning that cut the A’s lead in half.  He had 3 RBI’s and 1 run scored and he and Kevin Youkilis were the only 2 Red Sox hitters who had more than 1 hit in the game.

The Bad – David Ortiz – Ortiz has really been in a funk of late.  Big Papi has just 3 hits in the Red Sox last 7 games.  He has not had a multi-hit game or a home since before the All-Star Break.  Ortiz’s batting average is down to .250 right now he has now struck out 84 times in 276 at-bats.  The Red Sox need Big Papi to get hot again very soon.

Stat You May Have Missed – Jed Lowrie came off the disabled list, started at shortstop and batted in the 2-hole in between Darnell McDonald and Ortiz.  He had a productive day — After walkign in the 1st inning, he scored the game’s 1st run on Beltre’s single.  In the 5th inning, his 1st hit drove in Bill Hall to cut the A’s lead to 3-2.  He also added another walk later in the game.  In the field, he did have 1 throwing error, but it will be good to have him back in the mix to give Marco Scutaro a day off every so often…

The rotation is back to Plan A starting with tonight’s game against the Mariners in Seattle – John Lackey, then Josh Beckett, Jon Lester and Daisuke Matsuzaka for the rest of the weekend.  Assuming Buchholz is fine after yesterday’s start, he will start the opener against the Angels on Monday in Anaheim.

That was a tough loss on Tuesday night.  We had double the hits that the A’s did, yet still lost 5-4 in 10 innings.  So painful…

That “phantom” balk call in the 10th inning on Ramon Ramirez clearly set up the game-winning single by Kevin Kouzmanoff.  If the balk doesn’t move Daric Barton over to 2nd base, maybe Ramirez doesn’t have to intentionally walk Kurt Suzuki.  In any event, Manager Terry Francona made the right move to bring in Dustin Richardson to strike out Adam Rosales.  But then he made the wrong move playing the percentages as Kouzmanoff got the game-winning hit off of Michael Bowden to end the game.

Almost forgotten was the great double play turned Cliff Pennington and Mark Ellis that erased Mike Cameron at 2nd base and Bill Hall at 1st.  Dusty Brown singled right after that, so who knows what could have happened if the A’s middle infield didn’t make the flashy double play.

The Good — Marco Scutaro, Darnell McDonald and Adrian Beltre each had 2 hits.

The Bad — The Red Sox had 12 hits and 5 walks yet scored only 4 runs – all in the 1st 2 innings of the game.  Not good.

The Good — Tim Wakefield bounced back with a good outing – 4 runs (3 earned) on 3 hits and 2 walks with 5 K’s, although he took the no decision.

The Good — Many Delcarmen, Hideki Okajima and Daniel Bard worked 2 scoreless innings in the 7th and 8th innings.

Stat You May Have Missed - The 10th inning featured 2 ejections from the game.  The A’s Coco Crisp was ejected for arguing balls and strikes after he struck out to lead off the bottom of the 10th.  Then Red Sox pitching coach John Farrel was ejected for arguing a checked swing that was called a ball during the Adam Rosales at-bat against Richardson.

The loss pushed the Red Sox 6.5 games back of the Yankees and 4 games back of the Rays in the AL Wild Card race.  Ouch…

The Red Sox recovered from a rough 4-game series against the Rangers at Fenway Park over the weekend to pull off a nice 2-1 win over the A’s in Oakland.

The Good — Daisuke Matsuzaka – 6 2/3 quality innings allowing just 2 hits and 2 walks while making only 89 pitches.  The lone A’s run came off of a solo home run by Rajai Davis.

The Good — Daniel Bard – 20 holds?!  Gotta love Bard’s 2010 performance.  Bard has been the Red Sox most consistent reliever all season, and he may even be their “pitching MVP” at this point of the season.  His miniscule 0.84 WHIP and 1.80 ERA are incredible.

The Good — Jonathan Papelbon – Papelbon has been flying under the radar screen this season.  He now has 21 saves and a solid 1.03 WHIP.  The 3.23 ERA is a tad high, but that reflects a few bad outings where he got uncharacteristically lit up.  He worked a perfect 9th inning with 1 K to preserve the Red Sox 1-run win.

The Good — Adrian Beltre – This guy keeps on raking – 3 hits including a solo home run with 2 outs in the 4th inning that proved to be the game-winner.  He is hitting .333 with 15 HR’s, 58 RBI’s and 46 runs scored.  Think the Red Sox wished they had inked him to a longer deal now?  He is going to command a longer deal and some big $$$ this off-season, and may actually be worth it.

The Bad — the rest of the Red Sox lineup – just 5 hits for the rest of the team.  Not good.

Stat You May Have Missed — Leading 2-1 in the bottom of the 7th inning, Manager Terry Francona called upon Daniel Bard to end the scoring threat after Dice-K had allowed 2nd and 3rd with 2 outs.  Bard came through by forcing Gabe Gross to pop out weekly to Beltre at 3rd base.

Tim Wakefield looks to rebound from a 6-run 1st inning in his last start against the Rangers to give the Red Sox a chance to make it 2 wins in a row.  Wakefield’s time in the starting rotation is clearly numbered with the returns of Clay Buchholz and Josh Beckett this week.