The Red Sox had indeed claimed a crisp 1-0 victory from the arm of Daisuke Matsuzaka and the bat of Mike Lowell and the team's defense, the 39,339 in attendance witnessing a duel between Matsuzaka and C.C. Sabathia.
"I'm grateful for the one run that my teammates were able to score against him," Matsuzaka said through an interpreter. "That obviously made the difference. Since we'd won some games in a row coming into this game, I'm very glad that I didn't stop the winning streak."
That streak is now five games, equaling their longest of the season and matching the current run by the Yankees, who maintained their 7 1/2-game deficit with a 9-4 win over the Royals last night.
But it required a different sort of performance from Matsuzaka than his previous three outings. Since an outstanding eight innings of shutout ball against the Devil Rays July 3, Matsuzaka had given up six runs to Detroit, four to Toronto, and three to Chicago. And six walks against the White Sox didn't qualify as reassuring.
He recovered enough to throw seven innings (98 pitches, 60 strikes) of shutout ball, aiding the team's ninth blanking of the season, and collected his 12th win, the fifth American League pitcher to reach that mark this season. (Three were at last night's game, with Matsuzaka joining Josh Beckett and Sabathia.)
"It was nice to see out of anybody," manager Terry Francona said. "That's a good lineup. That was a major league game pitched by both guys. Not going to see too many 1-0 games here against that lineup.
"You throw the ball over the plate and they take pretty healthy swings. They're not just trying to put it in play. I thought his breaking ball tonight was sharper than we've seen. He threw some cutters tonight, I think one hit 90. That's pretty strong pitching."
And there was that guy on the other side, too.
