Daisuke's Night To Shine---Cleveland Beats the Yankees

It's all come down to an 8:37pm Fenway Park start tonight for Daisuke Matsuzaka. After experiencing a season of unforgettable highs and noteworthy lows, he now has the spotlight shining directly upon him. And if he remembers to follow Tek's call of the game and mix up his pitches, utilizing his tremendous off speed breaking stuff along with an overpowering fastball, he'll be fine, just fine. He did that in his last start against the Minnesota Twins, using every one (or almost every one) of his pitches to baffle the Twins for 8 solid as a rock innings. On the other hand, his mound opponent Kelvim Escobar has struggled to a 7.63 ERA in his last 3 starts. A Sox win will put them firmly in the catbird seat for this 5 game series. And everyone in Fenway Park tonight and those all around Red Sox Nation and Red Sox International will be fervently rooting for that exact thing to happen. The weather in Boston will feel like it's mid-summer, with temperatures in the low 80s at first pitch time drifting into and through the mid 70s by game's end. Perfect weather for a baseball game. Perfect weather for the Fenway Faithful, all 37,000 of 'em. Perfect weather for a Sox win.

In the Cleveland game, the Yankees and Chien Ming Wang were battered and bruised by the Cleveland lineup, losing by a score of 12-3. The pinstripers could not take advantage of a wild CC Sabathia, who threw 114 pitches in his 5 inning outing. The Indian bullpen was strong, however, and kept the New York club from scoring any more runs other than the three he gave up. Wang, on the other hand, only lasted 4 2/3 innings, giving up a monstrous 8 runs on 9 hits and 4 walks. He was sunk by his non-sinking sinker, a trend that I'd like to see continue. But that's predicated on him getting another start. It might not happen.

Click on the title of this post for the Herald's Steve Buckley's nice piece on the man who we rest our hopes and dreams on tonight, Daisuke Matsuzaka. Lets hope he can be "The Red Monster" yet again tonight. For his team. And for us. Have a wonderful Friday and a great weekend, and, as always, GO SOX. I'd love to read and respond to your comments on that Yankee loss or the upcoming Fenway Park Friday night lights.