Lester silences potent Phillie's bats 3-0

June 17, 2008. Philadelphia, PA. Jonathan Lester pitched seven strong innings, allowing six hits and walking only one, improving his record to 7-3. He has allowed three runs or less in each of his last 10 starts and is 5-1 with a 2.09 ERA over that span. Lester struck out five over seven shutout innings and Coco Crisp homered to lead the Bosox to a 3-0 win over the Phillies on Tuesday night. "I think his confidence is growing," Francona said of Lester. "It looks like he's trying to grow up as a major league pitcher."


"It seems like every start, things are getting better," Lester said. "Walks are going down, I'm more around the zone with better command of my stuff. I have the confidence to throw any pitch, any time." Lester peered over reporters' heads to catch a glimpse of the NBA Finals halftime show. Crisp gave him all the offense he needed with a two-run homer in the second inning off left-hander Jamie Moyer (7-4). Julio Lugo added an RBI double in the sixth. Papelbon struck out the side in the 9th for his 20th save.


Chase Utley, Ryan Howard and Pat Burrell finished 0-for-12 with eight strikeouts against three Boston pitchers. Burrell was impressed with Boston's lefty starter.
"We hadn't seen him before and he's pretty good," he said.

The Red Sox went wild on the basepaths, stealing a total of 6 bases. Jacoby Ellsbury stole his league-leading 34th base; was caught attempting to swipe 3rd base though, the 4th time a pitcher has nabbed him.

Coco Explains the Slide

Coco Crisp said his hard slide into Akinori Iwamura was payback for Tampa shortstop Jason Bartlett blocking the bag with his knee on Crisp's stolen base attempt two innings earlier.

He put his whole knee in front of the bag, and it's not something you do as an infielder. You can do that, but that's shady. And he's not a bad dude, but that's shady. It is what it is. You gonna hurt me, I'm going to come back and hurt you.If I would have intended to injure I wouldn't have slid at all. I would have just ran him over like he was a catcher. I went in hard to send a message. ... If Bartlett would have covered, might have been a little more dramatic.

A few minutes later, when Tampa manager Joe Maddon began yelling into the Red Sox dugout from the mound, Crisp yelled back:
I told him, "Look at me. Don't look down the street at Tito." ... I was saying I did that on my own, don't punish anyone else on the team. Don't get Petey, don't get Lugo, don't get AC [by] sliding hard at second base. Get me with a pitch. If you want to retaliate with somebody, I'm the man. That's pretty much it.