Boston Red Sox power their way to defeat Seattle Mariners 7-4 – MLB Update
The Boston Red Sox once again stamped their authority in Major League Baseball when they completed their 60th win of the season with a 7-4 rout of the Seattle Mariners at Fenway Park in Boston on Friday, July 22.
Boston increased their margin over second-placed New York Yankees to two games in the American League East Division and will now want to extend their two-game winning streak to at least four-games when they play the Mariners in two games over the weekend.
The Seattle Mariners, on the other hand, had nothing to cheer for as their losing-streak has now extended to 13 games, the league-worst. At one point, the Mariners were 43-43 for the season but bad luck has struck them and they have now slipped to 43-56.
Seattle is now placed at the bottom of the American League West Division and is virtually out of the race this season with a gap of 13.5 games from division leaders’ Texas Rangers.
The Mariners made a solid start with Ichiro Suzuki adding a run for them at the top of the first inning. Dustin Pedroia, however, was quick to respond and added the equaliser for Boston at the bottom of the first inning to take his hitting-streak to 19 games
this season.
Jacoby Ellsbury smashed the ball 449 feet for his 16th home-run of the season to register a one-run lead for the Red Sox in the third inning. After that, it was an intense competition at the mound between Felix Hernandez of Mariners and John Lackey
of Red Sox. Both pitchers are equally talented but it was Lackey who prevailed in the end as Hernandez was unglued by the Boston batters in the seventh inning for four runs.
Hernandez lost his ninth game of the season and his win-loss record (8-9) is now on the wrong road as the losses have exceeded the wins. Lackey, on the contrary, won his eighth game for his win-loss tally to total 8-8.
The Red Sox had an injury scare at the bottom of the seventh inning when their key player and third baseman Kevin Youkilis left the game with an injured right hand. Red Sox will be hoping that nothing serious happens to Youkilis as it will definitely hamper
the team chemistry.
The Mariners took charge in the eighth inning with a three-run homer but this effort seemed to come too late in the day. The scorecard showed a six-run deficit for the Mariners to chase when the eighth inning began. Down 7-1, hammering a home-run was nonetheless
appreciable. Mike Carp’s first home-run this season allowed Miguel Olivo and Justin Smoak to complete their runs and take the score to 7-4.
The Red Sox are now 1-0 in the three-game series with the next game scheduled for Saturday, July 23.
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