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And Thank You for visiting Sonoma Dave's Giant Red Sox Blog! This blog is an archive of most of my posts on Fenway West. Effective immediately, I will be be including posts about the San Francisco Giants, MLB, and on occasion, stuff that has nothing to do with baseball at all.

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Friday, April 29, 2011

Jason Bay hits a 'Little League Home Run'

Former Red Sox Jason Bay hit a 'Little League Home Run last night against the Houston Astros in New York yesterday. Bay hit a pop up to shallow right field. Houston Astros outfielder Hunter Pence dropped the ball and it took off for the right field corner. Bay was already bolting right out of the box and when he saw Pence drop the ball, he then put it into overdrive and made it all the way home standing up. Pence gets the dubious 4 base error added to his sheet.

Watch the video here


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Monday, April 25, 2011

And another road victory!

After starting off the 2011 campaign with a downright fugly 2-10 W-L record, the Red Sox have seemed to turn things around winning the next 5 of 6 games, giving them a 7-16 W-L record, leaving them 4 games out of 1st place. 

Josh Beckett turned in his 3rd outstanding performance in a row, hurling 8 innings of 3 hit, 2 run ball. He left the game with the 2 teams tied a 2 runs apiece. The Red Sox bullpen shined the way they had been expected to with Bard, Jenks and Papelbon tossing 3 shutout innings. 

Jed Lowrie got another hit tonight, while scoring 1 and knocking in 1 RBI. Pedroia got 3 hits, but the biggest hit of the night came from Adrian Gonzalez who knocked in the go ahead run in the 11th inning. 


Red Sox 4 Angels 2 BOX SCORE

Friday, April 22, 2011

Finally a road victory

The Red Sox notched their 1st road victory in Oakland today. The victory came on their 8th road game of the year and the 17th game of the 2011 campaign. Clay Buchholz was rattled from the start after Coco Crisp hit his 1st pitch of the game for a home run. Although he put up zeros into the 6th inning, 9 other A's made it onto the base paths, 5 coming from hits and 4 coming from walks. You can tell when Buchholz lets base runners get to him when he spends as much time throwing to the bases as he does to the batter. No matter, he did his job and left the game allowing only 1 Athletic cross home plate. In the 6th inning he gave up a double and 2 walks before leaving the game visibly upset with his performance. Enter Daniel Bard with the bases loaded. Cliff Pennington proceeded to smack Bard's 1st pitch, a 96 mph 4-seam fastball deep into the left field corner and out of view from where my brother and I were sitting. A's fans voiced their displeasure at the foul ball ruling. Pennington swung at 2 more 96 mph heaters and he sits down. Bard gets his 3rd Hold of the season after pitching 1.2 innings. Bobby Jenks didn't fare so well. He gave up another run in 0.2 IP. Pap earned his 3rd Save allowing the final A run.

The Sox faced yet another left handed pitcher leaving David Ortiz as the odd man out. Smokin' hot Jed Lowrie, who attended Stanford University, not far from here, hit his 3rd HR of the season,  which was his 2nd hit of the game. Drew and Youk also homered today.

The remarkably relatively well attended game (29+k) actually had a fair amount of A's fans in attendance at 'Fenway West.' Most games that I have been here for usually have well more Sox fans then A's fans. Nevertheless, there was a sizable Red Sox fan contingent in the house. 

The 'Emperor of Red Sox Nation,' a fixture on Sawxheads, was not seen today. But there was an adorable young family sitting directly in front of me and my brother (this one lives here, not the one who lives back east.)  The 6th inning rain sent them scurrying for cover with their 2 daughters. One good thing about the rain- it sent a good chunk of fans home early, leaving plenty of room on the train for the rest of us.







The 'Emperor'


Red Sox 5 Athletics 3 BOX SCORE

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

No Lost Game Streak




Thanks and a tip of the cap to Edward Achorn and artist Macleod

Alfred E. Neuman said it best


Quote of the day?

Monday, April 11, 2011

Ellsbury in the funny papers


Has anyone told the Red Sox that Spring Training is over?

Just sayin', ykwim? I mean, I'm not ready to pounce on a panic button just yet, jeez, guys, c'mon already! The Rangers are tough, but the Indians? Please, you guys can do better than that.

OK, 2011 season, take 2.

Where are they now?

"Where are they now? " is one of my occasional series of posts when I find a former Red Sox player in the news and post about them here.Brian Daubach is the manager of a the Washington Nationals farm team. Shea Hillenbrand has an interesting story to tell. Scott Hatteberg is scheduled to play himself in the "Moneyball" movie about Oakland A's GM Billy Beane. Freddy Sanchez, Ramon Ramirez and Javier Lopez are playing for the Giants and wearing World Series rings. The list goes on.

Over The Monster takes a trip around the majors and lists former Red Sox players on other MLB teams on Opening Day, 2011.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Red Sox cap sighting (04.01.11)


Jeff Miller of New Monsoon was seen sportin' a Red Sox cap in 2007 and was captured for all eternity by noted San Francisco Bay Area concert photographer Susan J. Weiand, who is a Red Sox fan originally from Massachusetts. Miller sat in with New Monsoon last night on this smokin' hot rendition of "Catfish John."



Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Quote of the day (03.31.11)

Print quote from Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe after Buck Showalter, manager of the Orioles, made questionable remarks about Theo Epstein and the budget he has to work with:

Anonymously order 100 pizzas from Sarasota House of Pizza, charge to Buck Showalter. That'll teach him.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Aceves throws five perfect innings



Alfredo Aceves threw five perfect innings for the Pawtucket Red Sox on Wednesday in Fort Myers, Fla., according to a tweet from announcer Dan Hoard.

Aceves recorded nine strikeouts and posted a strike-to-ball ratio of 44/17 against the Norfolk Tides.  Hideki Okajima entered the game in relief of Aceves and pitched a scoreless inning for the PawSox as well.

Hoard also reported that Aceves will start on Opening Night in Pawtucket.


*Dan Hoard also announces for the Cincinnatti Bengals.

Red Sox cap sighting (03.29.11)







I watch very little TV, so I have no idea what's going on at Survivor. I did happen to see a commercial for it last night while I was watching NCIS, and found a character on that show who goes by the name of Boston Rob and was sportin' his Red Sox cap.