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Red Sox Win Again; Rays' Lead Down To Half-Game

The Associated Press

Tampa Bay first baseman Carlos Pena gets the throw just in time to get Boston's Jason Varitek at first during the fifth inning at Fenway Park in Boston.

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By MARC LANCASTER | The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 9, 2008

BOSTON - Good times never seemed so bad for the Rays.

After another relatively well-played loss, 3-0 to the Red Sox on Monday night, the division lead no one expected them to possess could be gone with another setback tonight. Tampa Bay remains in good shape when it comes to making the playoffs, but the AL East supremacy the Rays have maintained for the majority of the season is down to a half-game and on the verge of evaporating.

As has been the case in all but one defeat during their current run of six losses in seven games, the Rays were within reasonable striking distance in the final inning. But once again their moribund offense had no answers in the face of an intimidating opposing hurler.

In this instance, it was Jonathan Papelbon, who put the Rays away in the ninth after coming on to record the final out of the previous inning by blowing a 97-mph fastball past Rocco Baldelli with runners on second and third. But most of the work was done by Jon Lester, who dominated the Rays yet again over 7 2/3 innings.

Tampa Bay now has been shut out in consecutive games for the first time since April 28-29, 2004 - both of them at Boston, naturally - and remains winless in seven games at Fenway Park this season. Still, Rays manager Joe Maddon refused several chances to sound any alarms after the game.

"The quality of our play is very good," Maddon said. "We've just run into a little bit of a snag hitting-wise and when you don't hit all of a sudden everybody wants to magnify the negativity of it. Don't become confused - we're playing well right now, we're just not hitting. We've got to get the bats going again."

It certainly didn't happen in the series opener. Lester, who has allowed two runs in 20 innings against the Rays this season, allowed a steady trickle of base runners but prevented them from going anywhere.

The Rays didn't push a runner past second base until Lester's final pitch, which turned into a ground-rule double off the bat of Carlos Pena with two outs in the eighth. The bounce out of play in Fenway's short corner was unlucky for the Rays, as Ben Zobrist would have scored from first if the ball had remained alive.

Instead, the Rays were left with men at second and third as the riverdancing closer Papelbon entered the game, and he quickly rang up Baldelli's fourth strikeout of the evening.

"We've had so many games where people have just come through in the right spot; we've had timely hitting all year," Baldelli said. "This last week, we just haven't, if you want to get right down to it. I think every guy can probably look in the mirror and say they've had an opportunity to help late in the game, and sometimes it just doesn't work out."

On the topic of things that didn't work out, Rays starter Edwin Jackson was left to lament his overly adrenalized first inning after he settled in and handled the Red Sox with relative ease the rest of the way.

Jackson was 0-3 with an 8.18 ERA in five previous appearances at Fenway Park and it looked like those numbers would get worse when he allowed three runs out of the gate on a double off the Green Monster by David Ortiz, an RBI single by Kevin Youkilis and a long homer by Jason Bay, the man that got away at the trade deadline.

Maddon had a talk with his pitcher following the inning, urging him to slow things down. Jackson took heed, but his offense's inability to make a dent in Boston's pitchers left him on the short end.

Frustrating? Sure.

"But right now we can't afford to get down and frustrated," Jackson said. "You just have to understand that it's like that sometimes and the only thing you can do to change it is just keep going out there and busting it every day until it changes."

If the Rays want to maintain the division lead they have held the entire second half, that change had better come tonight.

Reporter Marc Lancaster can be reached at (813) 259-7227 or mlancaster@tampatrib.com.

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