August 9, 2011

Fun With Elias

Culled from the recent press notes of both the Red Sox and Yankees (using information from The Elias Sports Bureau):

CC Sabathia is 0-4 against the Red Sox this year -- the first Yankees pitcher in 36 years to lose four games in a season to the Red Sox (Pat Dobson, 1-4, 1975). It's also the first time in Sabathia's career that he has lost four times to one team in a single season.

Better Red Than Dead reports that the last pitcher to lose five games to the Red Sox in one year was Jim Bunning, who lost by the scores of 3-2, 4-2, 1-0, 3-2, and 6-1 in 1951. The Red Sox and Yankees have six more games against each other. Go, CC, go!

The Red Sox enjoyed walk-off wins on August 2 (Ellsbury), 3 (Ellsbury) and 7 (Reddick), 2011. The last time Boston had three walk-off wins in a span of five games was not that long ago: 2006 -- July 29 (Ortiz) and 31 (Ortiz), and August 2 (Loretta).

Josh Reddick -- at 24 years, 169 days -- is the youngest Red Sox player to get a walk-off hit against the Yankees since Mario Guerrero -- 23 years, 307 days -- beat Sparky Lyle on August 1, 1973.

Boston is 10-2 against the Yankees this year -- only the third time the Red Sox have ever won 10 of a season's first 12 games against the Yankees: 1903 (10-2) and 1912 (12-0).

Sunday night's game was the eighth time in history that the Yankees and Red Sox have met, on or after August 1, tied for first place. Boston won the first two of those games, but had lost the last five, beginning with the game that decided the 1949 pennant.

Since going 0-6 on their first road trip of the year, the Red Sox have had a winning record in all seven of their subsequent road trips. It's the first time in team history the club has had a winning record in seven straight road trips.
April 19-28: 6-3 May 10-15: 3-2 May 23-29: 5-2 June 7-16: 8-1 June 24-July 3: 5-4 July 15-20: 4-2 July 29-31: 2-1
Jacoby Ellsbury had the first 6+-RBI game for a Boston leadoff man since Ellis Burks had seven RBI against Baltimore on June 10, 1987. Ellsbury is also the first Red Sox leadoff hitter ever to:
have a 6-RBI game against the Yankees
have a 6-RBI game at Fenway Park -- against anyone
On Monday morning, Adrian Gonzalez led MLB in batting average, RBI, hits and total bases. The last Red Sox player to lead the AL in average and RBI so late in a season was Carl Yastrzemski, when he won the Triple Crown in 1967.
Example
Don't forget to check out WEEI's Gary Marbry's latest Nuggetpalooza.
Example
Terry Francona said he gave Jason Varitek the green light to swing at a 3-0 pitch against the Yankees' Cory Wade in the sixth inning on Sunday night. Varitek fouled out.

Francona:
We do that a lot. To me, that was a guy that wanted to throw a breaking ball, so you get a fastball count. [Varitek] just popped it up. We give guys the green light probably a lot more than people think. They don't always swing.
Bobby Jenks was scheduled to throw a side session on Sunday, but it was cancelled because he was, according to Francona, "really sick. ... He had intestinal turmoil. ... They ended up having to keep him in the hospital for three days."

Joel Sherman of the New York Post was a guest on Dennis & Callahan show on Monday morning:
I think the Red Sox lineup poses very specific problems for Sabathia, which is they really grind out at-bats and force him to throw a lot of pitches. ... It is going to be very difficult for the Yankees to win four times in seven games if CC Sabathia cannot beat the Red Sox.

2 comments:

allan said...

You CANNOT make this stuff up!

Bruce Allen, Boston Sports Media Watch, Twitter:

"Massarotti says it is bad that the Red Sox are 4-0 against Sabathia - it adds pressure + they'll be expected to beat him in the playoffs."

And if CC had given the Sox the business four times this year, OF COURSE, Mazz would be saying this was great for the Red Sox because of all the pressure on CC to continue. When you're in the sports media game, you gotta be consistent.

andy said...

the thing is, you CAN make it up! The inanity is so predictable at this point, that the most ridiculous stance, completely made up by a satirist on a tuesday night, is pretty likely to appear in a mazz column on a wednesday morning.