But the ball hooked foul, just as Ortiz, knowing he was in front of a changeup, suspected it would. Ortiz lined out softly to third on the next pitch from Cleveland reliever Aaron Fultz, and there would be no salvaging Daisuke Matsuzaka's roughest outing on this side of the Big Pond, an 8-4 defeat to the Indians that ended the Sox' winning streak at five.
"I felt good at the plate," said Ortiz, back after a three-game absence because of barking hamstrings and, he said last night, sore quadriceps, too. "The days off helped me a lot. I felt a lot better. I think I was more excited about that than anything else. I was seeing the ball good. I wasn't jumping or doing anything crazy. He made good pitches."
The Indians had 18 hits, a dozen off Matsuzaka, who gave up six runs in 5 2/3 innings. Four of those hits came from Kelly Shoppach, the discarded Sox catching prospect, and former Sox right fielder Trot Nixon, who received three straight nights of standing ovations, doubled to start the decisive four-run rally in the sixth, when the Indians broke a 2-2 tie.
The Sox nonetheless took two of three from the American League's highest-scoring team this month, and ended May with a 20-8 record. It was their first 20-win month in three years (August 2004) and only their third 20-win month in the last eight seasons.
They have tonight off, then resume play tomorrow against the New York Yankees, who will begin June tied for last place in the AL East, 13 1/2 games behind the Sox.
"We're playing them again?" Ortiz said. "Why can't we be playing Tampa, or one of those guys?
"You've got to do what you've got to do with the schedule. Just got to play your game and get them out of the way. We're playing good. We just lost a game tonight."
Matsuzaka hadn't lost in six weeks (2-1 in Toronto April 17) and was coming off a Texas-sized bellyache last Friday night in Arlington, where he was seen suffering from dry heaves while lasting just five innings. Still, Matsuzaka talked like a man who had bailed out on the Good Ship Francona, while the Sox manager suggested his problems were nothing that a more consistent fastball couldn't fix.
