Sox salvage series thanks to Manny & Cora

Sox 5, Toronto 3

WP: Timlin (1-0)
LP: Marcum (1-1)
SV: Papelbon (4)
HRs: BOS-Manny (1); TOR-Rios (3), F. Thomas (2)
Sox box

This is the brand of MannyBeingManny Red Sox Nation likes to see

SUMMARY:
The Sox caught a break on getwaway day in Toronto when Blue Jay skipper John Gibbons mysteriously pulled Roy Halladay, who was cruising with a 3-1 lead, with one on & one out in the 8th inning.

One out and two pitchers later Manny Ramirez blasted his first home run of 2007 to tie the game, and the next inning Alex Cora tripled in pinch runner Julio Lugo to give Boston a 4-3 lead. The Sox would tack on an insurance run and hang on for the win.

HERO: Alex Cora 2-4, 3B, 1R, 1 huge RBI
Not only did the seldom-used utility player knock in the winning run in the 9th inning on an opposite-field triple, he made the defensive play of the game an inning earlier as well.

With men at 1st & 3rd and one out in the bottom of the 8th, Cora snagged a wild toss to second base from Mike Timlin, vaulted over a sliding Lyle Overbay and threw a dart to first base to complete the double play and help the Sox escape from a potential game-losing situation.

GOAT: Jays mgr. John Gibbons
Prepare to be 2nd, 3rd, & 4th guessed for days, Gibby; why would you take out your ace pitcher, who had been dominating the Sox hitters all day long, with one out and one on in the 8th inning when he had only thrown 95 pitches? I mean Halladay had just thrown a 10-inning complete game in his last start, in which he only threw 107 pitches.

Is it any wonder that last year this bozo had one player write inflammatory sayings on a chalk board in order to get traded away from this team and another whom he attempted to fight in the dugout tunnel during a game? What a classless, clueless clown.

KEY MOMENT: 1 on, 2 out, top of the 8th
With Gibbons pulling more switches than a gangbanger in a lowrider and slumping Manny at the plate it looked like the Sox were going to go down without a whimper in this one.

But Gibbons made one move too many, and as soon as he brought in Shaun Marcum to face ManRam, the GrillMaster deposited the ball in the rightfield stands for a game-tying, monkey-lifting homerun that made John Gibbons look like the dumbest man in Canada.

RECAP:
Let's get one thing straight right off the bat: Julian Tavarez is NEVER going to win a pitcher's duel with Roy Halladay. Got me?

That being said, the guy can get some fortuitous breaks, a couple or three clutch plays and one boneheaded managerial move and worm his way out of losing to the former Cy Young winner.

How do I know this? Because that's exactly what I saw happen today at Rogers Centre. For 5 1/2 innings Tavarez & Halladay played a game of hardball chicken, with both of them blinking just once each: Doc when he allowed a run on a walk, single & sac fly in the 2nd, and Julie when he returned the favor and gave up a leadoff homerun to Frank Thomas in the bottom of the inning.

And it stayed that way for the next few frames; the aged, veteran journeyman who never met a lead he didn't want to blow squaring off against the in-his-prime, lifelong Jay who makes his hay defeating scrubs like Tavarez in close games like these.

It was just a question of when Julie would blink again, it didn't take long to find out. RSN's fears were confirmed in the bottom of the 6th when the Jays touched Tavarez (5IP, 6H, 3ER, 0BB, 4Ks, 2HRs) for a pair of runs, the first on a blast by nemesis Alex Rios and the next on a Vernon Wells double that followed Adam Lind's single.

Just like that a tight, tied contest was "blown open" with the way Halladay was pitching, and it didn't look good for the Bosox to head into the New York series on a winning streak. But quicker than you can say "how do I manage a pitching staff?", Gibbons decided to send the Sox an early Christmas present, lifting Halladay in the 8th inning despite the low pitch total and his absolute domination up to that point.

To say Boston took advantage of the opportunity handed to them would be a major understatement. You could almost feel the weight being lifted of the Sox shoulders and small smiles creeping onto the Boston batter's faces knowing they would get a chance to mount a comeback against somebody other than one of the best pitchers in the major leagues.

The beginning of the end started innocently enough, with Coco Crisp (2-4, R, RBI) beating out his second bunt single of the game to lead off the 8th. Youk (1-5) quickly popped out to short, and it looked as if it would be up to Boston's best batters to get the better of Toronto's best pitcher if the Sox were going to pull this one out. Halladay (7.1IP, 6H, 2ER, 3BB, 2Ks) was able to induce Papi (1-3) into striking out, but that's when Gibbons made the move to the pen and 33,000+ at SkyDome stared, moths agape.

The rest, as they say, is history. Manny crushed a 2-1 offering from Marcum into the stale, Molson-scented dome air to tie the game, and after Cora's circus play saved a run in the bottom of the 8th, he tripled in the winning run in the top of the 9th to cap a terrific afternoon for himself and the Sox. Papelbon sealed the deal when he struck out two of the three batters he faced in the 9th, and the Sox packed up and headed home, ready to take on the Evil Empire for the first time this season.

NOTES:

-Tito tinkered with the lineup again, expected with a day game after a night game, and once again he saw mixed results:

• Lugo got the day off so Coco moved to back to the leadoff spot and responded with 2 bunt hits, a run and a run batted in.
• Youk played 3rd base and moved back up to the two-hole; he had 1 hit in 5 trips and left 3 runners on base
• Hinske got the start at first base and despite going 0-2 he knocked in the first run with a sac fly and also drew a walk
• We know what Cora did

- Cap'n Tek had another terrible day at the plate, going 0-4 and leaving 5 men on base to drop his average to a minuscule .189

-Not to be outdone at the bottom of the stats sheet, Dustin Pedroia pulled an o-fer-4 as well to see his average plummet to .167, same as Coco's

-Papelbon appeared on consecutive days for the first time this season and showed no ill effects; although he did allow a walk and struggled a bit with his control, he still fanned two batters, didn't allow a hit and has not allowed a run yet this season (shades of 2006)

-J.D. Drew had a single and two walks and has reached base in all 14 games this season

-The three relievers who followed Tavarez, Pineiro, Romero and Timlin, didn't exactly post stellar numbers- 3 2/3, 2 hits, 3 walks, 1 K -but managed to come through the fires without allowing a run

-Manny's homer was # 471 of his career, and if it gets him cranked up for the season we can expect to see #500 by late August

-Alex Rios absolutely owns Julian Tavarez; after his 2-3 showing against Gascan today, Rios is a stunning 7-9 with a double, triple, homer, walk, run, and rbi against him. Yikes!

QUOTES:

-"The location was terrible. I think my little sister probably could have hit it just as far, if not further."-Marcum on the gopherball he served up to Manny

RECORD: 9-5

AL EAST: Up 1 on NY

UP NEXT: Fri. vs. Stankees, 7PM ESPN

Pettitte vs. Schilling

Let's get it ON!