The Red Sox faced off against the Yankees and Jacoby Ellsbury returned to Fenway for the first time since he left the Sox to put on pinstripes. Lester followed Buchholz’s lead and struggled early and often and put the Sox in an early hole. The Sox bats couldn’t get much going against Tanaka and dropped the first game of the series.
Lester started off the game giving up a fan interference triple to center field and then Jeter hit a single to bring Ells home. The Yankees scored their second run of the game when Beltran hit an RBI single to score Jeter. Sox 0-2. Lester gave up 2 more runs in the 3rd inning when he gave up back to back RBI doubles to Teixeira and McCann. Sox 0-4.
The Sox were finally able to get on the scoreboard in the bottom of the 4th when Papi and Napoli hit back to back homers. Sox 2-4. Unfortunately, Lester was not able to keep it that way as he continued to struggle in the top of the 5th. Napoli had a fielding error that allowed Roberts to get to first and Teixeira to score. Lester then gave up an RBI double to Ellsbury to score two more runs. Lester was done for the night and Capuano was in the game. Capuano gave up an RBI single to Jeter and that closed the book on Lester. Sox 2-8. Lester’s pitching line for the night 118 pitches, 4.2 IP, 11 H, 8 R, 3 ER, 4 BB and 7 Ks. Sox 2-8.
Capuano came back out and pitched scoreless 6th and 7th innings all while Tanaka kept pitching crisp innings for the Yankees. Edward Mujica came out and pitched the 8th inning and continued to show signs of struggle. Mujica gave up a solo HR to Beltran to have the Yanks leading 9-2. Junichi Tazawa came out in the 9th and pitched a scoreless inning. The Sox bullpen has definitely been tested and taxed in the last few days. The Sox were able to get one more run before all was said and done when Gomes hit a double and then Bogaerts hit an RBI double to bring him home. Sox 3-9. That would be all the Sox would have and would drop the first game of the series.
Red Sox 3 Yankees 9 BOXSCORE
WP: Tanaka (3-0) LP: Lester (2-3)
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