When your favorite baseball team-the Boston Red Sox-wins nine games in a row-the longest streak in MLB this season-and polishes off a three-game sweep of the Toronto Blue Jays with a 14-1 win yesterday afternoon at the Rogers Centre, it's quite hard to not come off as the biggest honk in the world.
Boston (39-26) outscored Toronto (32-34) 35-6 over the three games. They have the best record in the American League and yesterday's starter Jon Lester (9-2) became the first nine-game winner in the AL. Only the Phillies (40-26) have a better record than the Red Sox. Finally, this is Boston's longest win streak in over two years (11 games, April 15-27 2009).
Lester submitted his best start of the season, going eight innings, allowing one earned run on two hits with a walk and eight strikeouts. For a guy that was really struggling with his control in May, the last two starts (14 innings, 4 earned runs, 16 strikeouts, 2 wins) have been what we've come to expect from baseball best lefty and one of the top starters in all of MLB.
Blue Jays rookie Kyle Drabek (4-5) had the unenviable task of trying to shut down the Red Sox attack that leads MLB in many offensive categories (1st in runs, 1st in batting average, 1st in OBP and 2nd in slugging percentage). He lasted only four innings, allowing eight earned runs on seven hits with four walks and five strikeouts.
When you examine Boston's current stretch of superb play, three hitters stand out above the rest: Jacoby Ellsbury (3 runs, 2 hits), Adrian Gonzalez (2 hits, 2 RBIs, 2 runs) and David Ortiz (4 RBIs, 2 hits, 2 runs). All three of those players are performing at an All-Star level and when you factor in the certainties that Dustin Pedroia (2 runs, 2 RBIs, 2 walks) and Kevin Youkilis (4 RBIs, 3 hits, 3 runs) will heat up more, this lineup is more stacked than Pamela Anderson in her mid-90s prime.
Gonzalez (9 straight games with an RBI) got the Red Sox out to their usual fast start with a solo homer, his 13th of the season, in the first. He added an RBI ground out in the third and Youkilis notched an RBI single for a 3-0 lead.
Jose Bautista hit his MLB-leading 21st homer in the fourth for Toronto's only run, 3-1.
Boston put up some crooked numbers with six runs in the fifth and three in the sixth to make it a complete laugher for the second day in a row.
Pedroia hit a two-run bomb, his fifth of the season, and Ortiz crushed a three-run bomb, his 17th of the season, in the fifth to stretch it to 8-1. Marco Scutaro (2 hits) added an RBI single in the fifth.
The good times continued in the sixth as Youk, Ortiz and Jarrod Saltalamacchia all put up RBI doubles to extend the lead to 12-1.
All that remained was a two-run shot by Youk, his ninth of the season, in the ninth and the fine folks of Toronto went home quietly.
Boston gets today off before beginning a three-game series in Tampa Bay tomorrow night, wrapping up their road trip (which is 6-0 so far) against divisional rivals. Tim Wakefield faces James Shields tomorrow night with the Rays four games behind the Red Sox in the AL East (Tampa Bay has a makeup game tonight in Detroit).
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