Boston @ Seattle preview
T-Mobile Park
Last Meeting ( Jul 24, 2010 ) Boston 1, Seattle 5
The Seattle Mariners decided to stop fighting and start winning – and for a night, it worked.
The Mariners will look to build on Saturday's victory as they host the Boston Red Sox on Sunday afternoon in the finale of a three-game set at Safeco Field.
A night after an ugly fracas in their dugout, the Mariners eventually got to a perfect Jon Lester and earned a 5-1 victory Saturday. The Mariners indicated they had turned the page from Friday’s melee when second baseman Chone Figgins was told he was being benched by manager Don Wakamatsu for not trying to make a play on an overthrow in the fifth inning.
Figgins and Wakamatsu got into a verbal altercation that quickly escalated to players scuffling with each other in the dugout.
Figgins was back in the lineup Saturday, making a nice back-handed play in the third inning and providing an RBI double in the eighth. The Mariners seemed ready to forget Friday night’s incident – everyone except for Figgins.
Asked if the benching was behind him, Figgins said not necessarily and added he was not certain if he and Wakamatsu were on the same page.
Boston, meanwhile, managed just five hits against four Seattle pitchers and scored on David Ortiz’s home run.
The meager effort wasted what started as a career night for Lester, who took a perfect game into the seventh. The Mariners never got a solid swing against him until Jack Wilson’s fly ball in the seventh, which Eric Patterson had in his glove but lost and was charged with an error. Lester then lost the no-hitter, the shutout and the lead when Michael Saunders hit a curveball to right for a two-run homer.
Lester finished with a career-high 13 strikeouts. He appeared frustrated after being charged with all five runs on four hits – a single, double, triple and home run.
After opening the series with back-to-back losses, the Mariners can prevent the Red Sox from winning the series Sunday afternoon and put together their first winning streak since June 29-30.
Daisuke Matsuzaka (7-3, 4.29) will try to earn the series win for the Red Sox against fellow right-hander Doug Fister (3-6, 3.56).
Matsuzaka has won two straight starts, striking out six in a 2-1 victory over Oakland on Monday. He is 4-0 in his last six road starts and 2-1 in six starts all-time against the Mariners.
Fister is 0-5 with a 5.33 ERA since a victory against Tampa Bay on May 14. He has never faced Boston.