Bumpy Ride For Buchholz

Clay Buchholz had a rough afternoon against Tampa Bay. In 5.1 innings, he faced 25 batters, allowed six runs and nine hits. He walked one batter and struck out four. If he wasn't exactly pleased with his performance, he was at least accepting of it.

I don't think there was anything in particular that was that bad. I left a couple pitches up, and they hit a couple home runs. Other than that, just little things. They hit a couple balls just out of reach. If those happened to be caught, it's two outs and it's a different scenario. I kept throwing the ball. I kept pounding the zone. I threw a good number of strikes to fastball hitters with the fastball. A couple hard-hit balls got out, and they got a couple runs off them. You're going to have a game like that every now and then. So I'll take this one.

In his first game out of the bullpen this spring, Justin Masterson struck out three in 2.2 innings. He allowed one hit -- a home run.

Boston won the game 8-7. Jason Varitek had two hits, including a dong, and three more RBI, giving him 15 this spring. Nick Green smacked a two-run triple and scored twice.

The Red Sox have two more games to play in Florida: Pirates tomorrow and Twins on Thursday. Then the team heads north to New York for two games (Friday night and Saturday afternoon) against the Mets at Citi Field.

Sunday is a day of rest -- and then Opening Day!