Red Sox at Angels, Game One: ALDS Liveblogging

The Phillies beat the Brewers, and the Dodgers hammered the Cubs, featuring a Manny Ramirez homer off of his shoetops to put away the Cubs in Wrigley.

Boston has a tough opening, wasting an Ellsbury double in the top of the first, then Jon Lester giving up two singles in the bottom half. Then walking Torii Hunter. Grumble.

But Big Jon escapes, getting a neat as you please little chopper to Mike Lowell to get a force out that ends it. Phew.

They seem to be reaching Lackey pretty well, but every ball is at somebody.

Lackey makes quick work of Boston in the second, and so its on to the bottom of the second.

Prognosticators seem to make much of the "Oh, Anaheim has struggled against Boston" theme. Yeah, they've lost a bunch of postseason games to Boston, but some of those were with Mike Witt on the mound, so that's not really relevant.

Lester retires Mike (Casa de) Napoli and Sarge Mathews easily, then gets Erick Aybar on a groundout. Easy pleasy lemon squeezy.

Leading off the third, Farmer Jed Lowrie takes one for the team, and now its Tek. Tek chops one to the mound, and Lackey is able to spin and get the out at second. Lowrie's slide prevents the double play, though. Then comes Ellsbury, and he also chops one up the middle. Kendrick makes a neat little flip to second to get another force, but again, no DP. Then a walk to our DP brings up the Big Guy, Papi. Papi gets jobbed on a strike call, gets a gift check swing call, and pops up to end the inning.

On to the bottom of the third, and Chone (sp) Figgins. Figgins works a 3-2 count, then whiffs on a hard inside fastball. Garrett Anderson, who is 432 years old, fights off a hard fastball for a nice opposite field single. Teixeira whiffs on a semi questionable check swing call. Now Vlad the Impaler. Vlad hits a catchable ball towards the middle, but Lowrie kicks it.

Shit.

Torii (Die Hard The) Hunter now. He is jammed, hits a sinking liner in front of (Sitting By The Dock of The) Bay, and Anderson slides in with the first run of the game and of the series.

Dang.

Kendrick now. Howie taps out, and that's it, end of three-1-0 Anaheim.