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Felix Doubront left the with just 3⅔ innings under his belt. The southpaw pitched well until the fourth where he got into trouble with the middle of the White Sox order; Alexei Ramirez and Paul Konerko singled and Avisail Garcia walked to load the bases. When Chicago scored four runs and the nine-hole hitter Tyler Flowers singled John Farrell finally pulled the starter. Brandon Workman took over and earned a win with just 1⅓ innings toeing the rubber. Farrell mixed the order of his relievers with Junichi Tazawa taking over for Franklin Morales with a runner on and one out in the seventh. Craig Breslow pitched in the eighth and surrendered a solo home run to Flowers. Dustin Pedroia’s togs provided visual reinforcement of his team’s name. He went 2-for-4 with a run scored and a walk, so perhaps the second baseman will go with his new look to support his superstitions. As part of September roster expansion the Red Sox added Quintin Berry, Rubby De La Rosa, Ryan Lavarnway, and Brandon Snyder. To make room on the roster Daniel Bard was designated for assignment. It is amazing to see the formerly heralded reliever fall so far from the ranks...
The Red Sox ruined what should have been a celebratory day for two significant reasons: Jackie Robinson Day and the announcement of Adrian Gonzalez’s seven-year, $154 million dollar contract extension. As Daisuke Matsuzaka had a few days before, Clay Buchholz almost put his team in the hole early in the game. With two men on Adam Lind launched a fly ball to right field that somehow found the top of the wall between Pesky’s Pole and the foul line painted on the right field wall padding. There is a third yellow line below the padding that is painted on to the wall. At first Paul Nauert ruled the shot a home run but after booth review the crew determined it was a foul ball. Lind ended up grounding out to second and Buchholz was spared a three-run roundtripper marring his line. Nothing in Fenway Park’s ground rules address this specific gap and there is no further guidance from the league’s universal ground rules. John Farrell seemed to be arguing for a ground-rule double, but the umpires considered anything to the right of the pole foul even if it happened to bounce off the top of the wall to the left...
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Photo courtesy of the Boston Public Library’s Sports Temples of Boston.