Sunday, September 21, 2008 – Daisuke Matsuzaka came up big-time for the Boston Red Sox on Sunday afternoon, pitching seven shut out innings against the Toronto Blue Jays. Hideki Okajima came in for the 8th inning and had no problem, and then Jonathan Papelbon earned his 40th save.
The Blue Jays sent Scott Richmond to the mound. His record since his call-up is 0-3, but he didn’t pitch all thad bad. It just seemed that Red Sox centerfielder Jacoby Ellsbury had his number.
Ellsbury tripled in his first at bat, and scored on a sac fly by Dustin Pedroia.
In the third inning, Jacoby doubled, moved to third on a Pedroia groundout, then was able to trot home after David Ortiz hit a homerun.
That was all the scoring the Red Sox had, but that was all they needed.
Jacoby had another double, in the fifth, but didn’t get to score that time!
For the Blue Jays, no player managed to get past second base after the second inning.
As a result of this win, the Red Sox (91-64) need only one more win –or a New York loss– to secure a playoff spot. And since the Tampa Bay Rays lost today, the Sox even have a chance to take the division lead from then. It all depends on how the next few games for each club are going to shake out.