Revved Sox

Winning streak hits 5 as they shine in home opener

April 12, 2006|Chris Snow, Globe Staff

So it wasn't quite last year's Opening Day. No World Series banner unfurled, no rings, no Bill Russell, no laughing Mariano Rivera taking a bow, no Alex Rodriguez miscue to open the floodgates. It wasn't perfect. But it was, as the day played out, proper.

Mike Lowell, known in these parts more for his momentous offensive decline of 2005 than for the sharp mind and bat that made him a catalyst in Florida, twice dented the Monster in equaling career highs in hits (4) and doubles (3). Josh Beckett, as good as he is, didn't mesmerize but did something perhaps more important. He competed, somehow lasting seven innings despite a nightmarish three-walk, 36-pitch opening inning. Alex Gonzalez, who if he ever loses his will to play baseball probably can land a job in the circus, turned an odd and magnificent double play, on a ball that Mark Loretta leaped to snare but instead knocked down, in the vicinity of second base. Gonzalez scooped it up, stepped on second, and cut down Bengie Molina at first.

And Jonathan Papelbon, in a mere 10 pitches, after coming out to Springsteen's ''Glory Days" (he's thinking about getting something more, well, closer-ish), nailed it down, his fourth save in four opportunities, for a 5-3 win before a record home opener crowd of 35,491 in a restored and re-energized Fenway Park. The win, the Sox' fifth in a row, improved them to 6-1, matching the best seven-game start in the club's 105 previous seasons.

''Built some character for me," Beckett said of his lengthy inning, encapsulating in five words a sentiment he shared with many members of the new Sox.

Beckett, for the second consecutive start, labored in the first inning. At Texas last Wednesday, he gave up a run before recording an out, needed 23 pitches to get through one inning, then held the Rangers to four hits and no runs over the next six innings. Yesterday, he was similarly off early. He said it might have been a ''focus factor," or ''kind of feeling things out."

''The only way a guy like that gets rattled is when he rattles himself," Curt Schilling said. ''An opponent isn't going to rattle him."

Beckett recorded one quick out, then went walk-single-walk-walk, the last walk to Lyle Overbay forced in a run. He went to four full counts in the inning and nearly walked in another run when he threw a comeback fastball on 3-and-1 to Shea Hillenbrand that Hillenbrand thought was a ball, to the point that he started to take his base. But it was called a strike, and Beckett came back three pitches later to get Hillenbrand to ground to Gonzalez for a 6-4-3 double play.