Santana Shines As Mets Shock Sox
METS 5RED SOX 3
If someone told you that the New York Mets would go to Boston without the services of Carlos Delgado and Jose Reyes, that they would have Dan Murphy leading off, and Ryan Church batting second. That Ramon Martinez would start at short, Jeremy Reed would start in center field, and Johan Santana was going into the game with a 6.98 career ERA at Fenway, you probably bet that the Mets would lose.
As ESPN's Chris Berman likes to say, "THAT'S WHY THEY PLAY THE GAME!"
Santana was brilliant against the Sox, getting stronger with each inning, and even shouting back at Boston's boisterous first baseman Kevin Youklis after Youklis leaned into one of Santana's pitches in the fifth inning. Santana was great: seven innings, six hits, three runs, two earned runs and eight strike outs. He made the Red Sox look foolish all night long, in what was his most important start of the year, considering the Mets were reeling from insult and injury.
In the fourth, the Mets broke the game open off of Dice-K Matsuzaka, who was returning from the DL tonight for Boston. Carlos Beltran laced a ground rule double to the short wall in right to get things going. After Gary Sheffield walked, David Wright singled to center to drive in Beltran to give the Mets a 2-1 lead. Later, Omar Santos singled to left to drive in Sheffield to make it 3-1 Metroplitans. Finally it was Martinez, whose RBI single to center turned out to be the biggest at bat of the inning, handing the Mets a 4-1 lead. His RBI would be the deciding RBI of the night.
The Red Sox did make it interesting, when Martinez's throwing error in the bottom of the fourth allowed Mike Lowell and J.D. Drew to score to cut the Met lead to one run. This is where Santana bore down, allowing only one Red Sox to reach base in his final three innings of work. Bobby Parnell was brilliant in his one inning of relief and K-Rod was fantastic yet again in the ninth, retiring the Sox in order to seal the deal for the Metropolitans.
Box Score.
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