Tonight our newly minted ace takes the mound with the aim of helping his team reach .500. Again.

Dear Red Sox offense,
Forget the standings, forget buying and selling and waivers, forget anything but this game. Win it. Play clean defense. Make the Twins rookie pitcher throw strikes, watch the bad pitches go by, wait for a pitch you can hit, foul off the two strike pitches you can't hit, practice what made you so good a few years ago.
Thanks,
UOTM

Go Sox go!

free of expectations maybe the individules will play better.

Game 108: Twins at Red Sox
Matt Pepin, Boston.com Staff August 4, 2012 02:35 PM

RED SOX (53-54)
Ellsbury CF
Crawford LF
Pedroia 2B
Gonzalez 1B
Ross RF
Saltalamacchia DH
Aviles SS
Shoppach C
Punto 3B
Pitching: RHP Clay Buchholz (9-3, 4.75)

TWINS (46-60)
Span CF
Revere RF
Mauer 1B
Morneau DH
Doumit C
Mastroianni LF
Dozier SS
Casilla 2B
Carroll 3B
Pitching: RHP Cole De Vries (2-2, 3.98)

Game time: 7:10 p.m.

TV/Radio: NESN/WEEI

Red Sox vs. De Vries: No history

Twins vs. Buchholz: Morneau 5-11, Span 4-10, Mauer 3-7, Carroll 0-3, Casilla 3-3, Revere 2-3, Willingham 2-3, Valencia 0-2

Stat of the Day: Adrian Gonzalez raised his batting average by at least a point every game from July 27 to Thursday, going from .290 to .302. He was 12-for-25 during that stretch.

Notes: Buchholz has not lost a game since July 14. ... The Red Sox are back under .500 for the first time since July 28. ... The Twins have won consecutive games against the Red Sox for the first time since 2009. ... De Vries made his Major League debut on May 24 and lost to the White Sox. He has made 10 starts. .... Gonzalez leads baseball with a .416 average with runners in scoring position this season. ... The Red Sox are 32-16 when they score first. ... Despite dropping the last two games, the Red Sox lead the season series vs. the Twins, 3-2. ... Manager Bobby Valentine is four games away from 3,000 games managed in his career. ... Pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka is scheduled to make a rehab start Sunday for the Pawtucket Red Sox.

Crawfords' bat seems to be picking up.



Old Faithful, Maine Monster is at Fenway tonight :VBG: Monster Mojo!

Mastroianni was another fan favorite when he was with the Fisher Cats in Manchester. I don't remember much about him other than spelling or pronouncing his name was a challenge.

Twins threatening after Morneau singles and ends up on third , pick off error by Clay.



Doumit (?) singles,, 2 on one out

Nice play by Punto, saved a run, Clay appreciative.

Thank you, Mike! 2-0!

Lovely Home Run from Mike Avilles!!!!!!!!!
2-0


I like it!!!

Hi HomeHalf: you there?

I do enjoy watching Mr. Buchholz pitch these days.

Yup - working and listening. Looks like Off is here as well. And I see Bobby Doerr in the member list but not on the thread.

Clay is having problems with his pick off today.

I see Bobby Doer!!!!

Hi Macs

A spring training refresher course might be in order, methinks.

Hey! Good to see you!

Do you think Shoppach wants to be on this team, he sucks, I vote him off

I suspect we're thinking that through with Lavarnway.

HomeHalf, BobbyDoerr, Offbase and Palarch too! You never know which Monsters are sharing our seat at the Game! With Old Faithful in the Park the Monster Mojo is strong!

A nice Doubleplay ends that threat!

Monster Mojo is rocks!

It would be nice to get a few runs this inning.

There's the first base hit since the second inning.

He's not having a great game, but I'd rather see Shoppach / Lavarnway than Salty / Lavarnway. I think the pitchers would too judging by the results with each catcher that I've seen recently (but will have to hunt down).

3Ks on 10 pitches for Stoppach. I think he can get better for sure.

Another solid effort from Clay.

Catcher's ERA:
Shoppach 3.74 in 38 games started
Saltalamacchia 4.65 in 68 games started

Caught stealing percent:
Shoppach: 37%
Salty: 20%

Bad time for Miller to remember how to pitch badly.

OMG!

PEDRO'S FIRST HOME RUN!!!!!!!


3-2 :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

Pedro! Pedro! Pedro!

Ciriaco goes yard! :clap:

Ross makes it 4-2. Breathing becomes a tiny bit easier.

Cody with the rbi single. :thumbup:

OK, with Morales pitching tomorrow, I understand trying to save the bullpen tonight, but is Bobby really going to leave Aceves in there until his arm falls off?

Fuck you, Bobby.

This has been a very long season. :GAK!:

Wow.

Well, tickets should be pretty easy to find and pretty cheap now.

I'm with you on this Off, Aceves looked like he was really laboring out there tonight.

What a waste of a good Buchholz start.