Kevin Millar

Former Red Sox first baseman Kevin Millar appeared on the Mut & Merloni show Friday for his weekly spot to comment on Adrian Gonzalez‘s home run prediction, the Red Sox rotation, the state of leadership in the Sox clubhouse and Jonathan Papelbon. To hear the interview, go to the Mut & Merloni audio on demand page.

Gonzalez made a comment Wednesday night saying that he was going to hit a home run in Thursday’s game against the Rays. Tampa Bay starting pitcher Matt Moore might have responded to those comments by hitting Gonzalez with a pitch Thursday. Millar, though, enjoyed Gonzalez’s comments as well as Moore’s response.

“I don’t know how Adrian was saying it, a little sarcastic, but a little bit serious. It’s all in fun. I don’t know if Moore went out there and drilled him on purpose. Only they know. I like Adrian with a little fire, saying, ‘You know what, I’m going to go deep.’ I like to see that out of him. If you ask me, that’s what he lacks.”

Added Millar: “Yeah, I liked it. I liked both sides.”

With the Red Sox winning six out of their last seven, Millar expressed optimism with the season going forward.

“The season will play itself out,” he said. “We get so caught up in numbers, ERAs and stats in the beginning of the season. We can’t forget we played the game, we struggled, we got off to bad starts. … When the dust settles, everyone goes back to where they’re at.”

Millar of the Red Sox starting pitching, specifically Josh Beckett and Clay Buchholz: “Beckett will settle in. He’s not a seven ERA pitcher and Buchholz is not a nine ERA pitcher. Are they going to go 21-4 like everyone wants? Probably not.”

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Adrian Gonzalez watches his third-inning blast go just to the right of the right-field foul pole. (AP)

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — This time, it was the Red Sox who won the pitchers’ duel at Tropicana Field.

Felix Doubront out-dueled his rookie counterpart, Tampa Bay lefty Matt Moore, on the way to leading the Red Sox to a 5-3 win over the Rays in the teams’ series finale Thursday night. Doubront picked up his fourth win while lowering his ERA to 4.09 after allowing two runs (one earned) over 5 2/3 innings.

Leading the offense was Cody Ross, who drove in four of the Red Sox’ five runs.

WHAT WENT RIGHT

• Ross got the Sox on the board first with a two-out bases loaded walk, scoring Mike Aviles. The pitch came on a 3-2 changeup, punctuating an eight-pitch at-bat. Moore had loaded the bases thanks to singles by Aviles and David Ortiz, and Adrian Gonzalez being hit by a pitch. Moore finished the first having thrown 33 pitches.

• Marlon Byrd broke his streak of not hitting a home run in 126 at-bats, rocketing a 3-2 pitch from Moore over the center field fence to lead off the second inning and give the visitors a 2-0 lead.

• Ross handed the Red Sox their third run of the game with his seventh homer of the season, launching a Moore 0-2 changeup over the center-field fence.

• Doubront got out of a huge jam in the fourth inning when he induced a hard line drive right at Gonzalez at first off the bat of Luke Scott. The Sox starter was most likely one batter away from being pulled, having finished the fourth at 78 pitches with Scott Atchison warming up.

• Rich Hill got Doubront out of a tough spot in the sixth inning, getting the first batter he faced, Scott, to fly out to left field, stranding runners on second and third while preserving the Sox’ one-run lead.

• Ross capped the scoring for the Red Sox with a two-run single in the eighth inning, grounding a ball up the middle to score Dustin Pedroia and Ortiz. It marked the 18th time in Ross’ career he has totaled at least four RBI in a game, having last done it on April 14 against the Rays.

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Clay Buchholz

Clay Buchholz may be the Red Sox starter with the highest ERA, but he is also the one with the most wins, a number bolstered by a 7-5 victory over Cleveland in his last start. The righty tossed 6 1/3 innings, giving up three earned runs and three walks.

Buchholz (4-1) will attempt to help the Red Sox match their longest win streak of the season at six when he takes the mound Wednesday night against the Rays.

The Texas native has recorded an ERA of 8.31 through seven starts. Despite this, Buchholz has a team-high four wins. The 27-year-old last faced Tampa Bay and Hellickson on April 14. Buchholz pitched seven innings and overcame five earned runs, three walks and a home run to earn the victory as the Sox won 13-5. He is 5-2 all-time against the Rays with an ERA of 2.38.

Luke Scott is the Ray who has faced Buchholz the most, accumulating 25 plate appearances and recording five RBIs, three walks and four strikeouts. Jose Molina has the Rays’ highest batting average against Buchholz, batting .500 in 10 appearances.

Jeremy Hellickson will serve as Buchholz’s counterpart Wednesday night. Although he is undefeated, Hellickson (3-0, 2.95) has not recorded a decision since an April 25 win over the Angels. He lasted 6 2/3 innings in his last outing against Baltimore and surrendered three earned runs. The Iowa native turned in the shortest outing of his career in the start before his appearance against Baltimore, tossing 102 pitches through 3 2/3 innings against Oakland. The Rays have lost Hellickson’s last two starts.

Hellickson did not fare well the last time he took the mound against the Red Sox, pitching five innings and allowing five earned runs and three home runs. Hellickson did not factor in the decision, but the Rays lost.

He has faced Boston five times, recording an ERA of 4.21 and two wins. While seven current Red Sox batters have faced Hellickson, Adrian Gonzalez has been Boston’s biggest threat against the righty. Gonzalez has faced Hellickson 15 times, pressing the pitcher for four RBIs and four walks as well as a home run. David Ortiz has Boston’s highest batting average against Hellickson, batting .462 in 15 plate appearances. Read the rest of this entry »

Clay Buchholz turned in his first quality start of 2012. (AP)

The Red Sox have been desperate for quality starts, and no one has inspired more desperation than Clay Buchholz.

The right-hander allowed five or more earned runs in each of his first six starts of the year, posting a major league-worst 9.09 ERA and 2.02 WHIP. He’d been a mess, seemingly reluctant to use a changeup that had long been his most dominant weapon and unable to locate his fastball consistently. In six starts, he was averaging about 5 1/3 innings, and most recently, he was shelled by the Orioles last Sunday for five runs on seven hits in just 3 2/3 innings.

And so, Friday’s outing represented something of a landmark in the team’s season. For the first time all year, Buchholz managed to control the damage done by an opposing lineup, allowing the Indians four runs (three earned) on eight hits in 6 1/3 innings. At the time he left the game (with the bases loaded and one out), the Sox were up, 7-1, in an eventual 7-5 victory.

Still, while he recorded his first quality start of the season, Buchholz was not dominant. Far from.

For just the second time in his career, he did not record a strikeout in a start. (The first came on Aug. 20, 2008, and immediately preceded a demotion to Double-A for Buchholz.) He allowed eight hits (six singles, two doubles), walked three, hit a man and was the beneficiary of multiple critical defensive plays by his outfielders that kept the game at bay.

Nonetheless, for Buchholz, the final line represented a potential life raft in a season where he has been adrift in unfamiliar waters. For the first time this year, he allowed fewer than five earned runs, thus snapping a string of six straight starts of such a yield (the longest by a Sox starter since Red Ruffing had eight straight starts in which he gave up at least five or more earned runs in 1925).

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Adrian Gonzalez went 0-for-8 in Sunday's loss. (AP)

It appeared that Adrian Gonzalez was finding his way. After a slow start to the year, he amassed consecutive three-hit games against the Orioles on Friday and Saturday, improving to .284 with a .350 OBP and .402 slugging mark for the year and looking every bit like a player getting ready to make his impact on the Red Sox.

And then, Sunday happened.

In the Red Sox’ 9-6, 17-inning loss, Gonzalez went 0-for-8 with two strikeouts and grounded into a double play, becoming the first Red Sox cleanup hitter ever to go hitless in eight or more plate appearances. The manner in which his outs were recorded suggested a hitter who had completely lost the feel he showed at the plate the previous two games, particularly in his four at-bats in extra innings.

Gonzalez — who told a team spokesperson that he was not available to talk after the game — recorded weak outs on the first pitch of three straight at-bats, grounding to second while leading off the 10th against Orioles reliever Kevin Gregg, with two outs and the potential winning run on first in the bottom of the 12th against Matt Lindstrom, grounding out to shortstop to lead off the 15th against Jim Johnson and, finally, striking out on three pitches against Orioles DH-turned-pitcher Chris Davis in the bottom of the 17th, at a time when Gonzalez represented the tying run.

In the process, Gonzalez (who, manager Bobby Valentine noted, volunteered to pitch in the late innings) became just the ninth Red Sox since 1918 to endure an 0-for-8 contest. If there is some solace for the first baseman to glean from the career-worst performance, it is in the last Red Sox player to suffer such a day at the dish. Last July 17, Jacoby Ellsbury went 0-for-8 in a 16-inning game against the Rays. Over the rest of the season, he hit .336 with a .385 OBP, .629 slugging mark, 1.014 OPS and 19 homers in 66 games.

Felix Doubront

Felix Doubront and the Red Sox have faced many challenges and setbacks in the brief 2012 season, but perhaps their biggest obstacle yet will be staring them down on the mound Thursday at U.S. Cellular Field in Chicago — that is, perfection, as the Red Sox will be the first team to face White Sox pitcher Philip Humber since his perfect game Sunday against the Mariners.

It will be yet another tough task in a season full of struggles, as the Red Sox sit at 7-10 and the cellar of the American League East. However, the Sox have won their last three games and will look to continue that steak as they move from Minnesota to Chicago. In their effort to continue their recent winning ways, the Red Sox will be aided on the mound by a pitcher in Doubront who has been something of a pleasant surprise in what has thus far been a disappointing season for the team.

Through three starts, Doubront has a 3.94 ERA, along with 20 strikeouts to seven walks, although all three of his starts have resulted in no-decisions. The left-hander is coming off what might have been his best outing of the season, going six innings and giving up one earned run with seven strikeouts, though he ultimately had nothing to show for it as the Red Sox surrendered a 9-0 lead heading into the sixth inning to lose 15-9 to the Yankees on Sunday.

Doubront has never pitched against the White Sox or in U.S. Cellular Field in what is now his third MLB season. In career road games, he has been less than stellar, going 1-1 with a 5.40 ERA in 11 games, only one of which has been a start. That start came in his first start this season on April 9 against the Blue Jays, a game in which he threw five innings and gave up two earned runs.

In addition to never having faced the White Sox in his career, Doubront has never faced a single hitter in the White Sox lineup. Through 17 games in the 2012 season, the White Sox have proven to be a fairly average offense, ranking eighth among American League teams in batting average with the team batting .248.

Humber, the third overall pick in the 2004 MLB draft, has bounced around to four teams since debuting with the Mets in 2006, but he’s coming off the signature moment of his career as he threw the 21st perfect game in major league history against the Mariners.

That performance came in his second game of the season. In his first start, Humber wasn’t quite perfect, but he did have an impressive outing as he went 5 1/3 innings and gave up only one earned run with seven strikeouts against the Orioles. However, as with Doubront against the Yankees, the White Sox squandered a late lead by giving up six runs in the ninth inning, eventually losing 10-4. For the season, Humber is 1-0 with a 0.63 ERA, 16 strikeouts and three walks in two outings.

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