Beckett Wins 16th...Red Sox 6 1/2 Ahead of Yankees
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by Niteowl049
Baseball Notebook
Josh Beckett Wins 16th
Josh Beckett (16-5) pitched the Red Sox to an 11-3 win in the first game of a day/night doubleheader becoming the first major league pitcher to win 16 games. Tim Wakefield and Tim Hudson try for their 16th win today. The Red Sox also won the second game of the doubleheader 10-1 behind the pitching of Curt Schilling (8-5) and David Ortiz who hit his 23rd home run. The Chicago White Sox, who lost both ends of the doubleheader fell to a game and a half behind the Kansas City Royals in the AL Central and have sole possession of last place and to think just two years ago they were World Champions and now only the Tampa Bay Devil Rays have a worst winning percentage of all the major league teams.
The doubleheader wins combined with a New York Yankees loss to the Detroit Tigers stretched the Red Sox lead to 6 1/2 games. If the situation had been reversed with the Red Sox losing both games and if Yankees had won the Yankees would have been 3 1/2 games back of the Red Sox. Alex Rodriguez hit his 43rd home run of the season which is one more than Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz have combined.
The Yankees lost to the Tigers 9-6 on a walkoff homer when Carlos Guillen belted a 1-2 pitch over the left field wall. Both starting pitchers were hammered with Roger Clemens giving up 6 runs and 6 hits in 5 innings and Andrew Miller giving up up 6 runs and 7 hits in 4 1/3 innings.
Curtis Granderson doubled and tripled twice off of Clemens as he had a 4 for 6 night while Magglio Ordonez was also 4 for 6 and hit his 25th home run. Alex Rodriguez hit his 43rd home run of the season and still remained 14 home runs ahead of second place Justin Morneau finally hit his 29th of the season. Rodriguez needs seven home runs to have 50 or more home runs for the third time in his career and the first time since 2002. The Tigers win moved them to within a game and a half of the first place Indians who lost to the Royals proving again that even though the Cleveland Indians were playing the weaker team while the Tigers were playing a stronger team that you still have to win the games on the field not on paper.
Felix Hernandez (10-6) defeated the Texas Rangers 4-2 as he won his fourth straight decision and hasn't lost since the 22nd of July. He has posted a 6-2 record in his last ten games....Jered Weaver (9-6) pitched six scoreless innings as the Los Angeles Angels shut out the Toronto Blue Jays 3-0 with Roy Halladay (14-6) taking a complete game loss.
The Philadelphia Phillies lost to the San Diego Padres 14-3 and have been outscored 34-8 in their last three games. Greg Maddux (10-9) took the win while posting his 343rd career win. The win enabled Maddux to break out of tie for ninth place in wins with Tim Keefe and leaves him ten wins short of catching eighth place Roger Clemens with 353. Jamie Moyer (11-10) lost his second game in a row after having won his previous four decisions. In his last two games he has allowed 13 runs and 19 hits in 8 2/3 innings. The Phillies are still in second place but only by one percentage point over the Atlanta Braves.
Aaron Harang (14-3) is probably the least mentioned of the top hurlers in majors today, but he is quietly having a good season despite the Reds being out of the NL Central race. Red won their fourth game in a row and their seventh of last ten games as they defeated the Florida Marlins 5-3. Brandon Phillips hit his 24th home run. Phillips had hit a total of 6 home runs in four years with the Indians but has hit 41 so far in his first two seasons with the Reds.
Oliver Perez (12-8) defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers and Brad Penny (14-4) by a score of 4-2 and is a candidate for Comeback Player of the Year after having a 3-13 record last season....The Colorado Rockies were trailing 5-1 entering the bottom of the ninth inning but scored five times in the frame and won 6-5....The Atlanta Braves defeated the St. Louis Cardinals behind the pitching of John Smoltz (12-6) while Kip Wells (6-14) took the loss. If the Cardinals don't win this season it will be because of having Wells and Anthony Reyes in the rotation who have a combined 8-27 record with both pitchers having an ERA of over 5.00. You can't spot the other team five runs a game and expect to win many games.
Edgar Renteria, who returned to disabled list on Thursday is now tied with Chad Utley who is also on the disabled list for the NL batting lead at .336....Balco Bonds hit his 27th home run of the season and Noah Lowry (14-7) took the 11-6 win over the Milwaukee Brewers. The San Francisco Giants pounded out 15 hits against Claudio Vargas and three relievers including Chris Capuano (5-11) who lost the game in relief allowing four runs and six hits. The Brewers had 16 hits of their own but they couldn't outhit the lousy Brewers pitching.
Looks like Capuano is going to find a way to lose whether as a starter or as a reliever. Claudio Vargas could only get two outs before being removed after allowing 6 runs and 5 hits. Capuano who was 18-12 in 2005 has been 16-23 since then and has not won since the 7th of May and has lost his last 11 decisions. In July and August he has a 0-6 record with an ERA of 5.45 in July and 8.10 in August. He has pitched 60 innings over those two months and has allowed 46 runs and 76 hits in that time span.
The Chicago Cubs moved to a game and a half over the Brewers after their 6-2 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks. Steve Phillips may be right about the Diamondbacks being too young to handle the pressure of a pennant race as they have lost four of their last five games and are only two games ahead of the Padres.
Micah Owings who hit his fourth home run while taking the loss leads all major league pitchers with 4 home runs with Matt Cain and Carlos Zambrano the only other pitchers to even have 2 home runs. Owings also leads in RBI's with 12 to the 7 of second place Tim Hudson. Kip Wells leads pitchers in hitting with 15 hits in 45 at bats for a .333 average with Owings second hitting .283. Owings leads in slugging with a .630 percentage with two doubles, a triple and 4 home runs.
