The Red Sox are set to kick off their three-game set against the Athletics as Daisuke Matsuzaka takes on Jarrod Parker.
We'll keep you up-to-date on all the action as it goes down in the Coliseum.
Athletics 6, Red Sox 1, End 8th -- Melancon adds to his sterling body of mop-up work with another 1-2-3 frame. Given the five-run deficit and three outs remaining, however, it doesn't seem like it's going to factor into the outcome all that much.
Athletics 6, Red Sox 1, Mid 8th -- The Sox are back to being difficult to watch, it seems. While a trip out west can effect the best of offenses, especially playing in parks like Safeco and the Coliseum, the Sox now have 10 runs in some 46 innings. It's getting painful to watch all the wasted baserunners and impatient outs. Add in an early Daisuke game, and this game has been an absolute slog.
Athletics 6, Red Sox 1, End 7th -- Mark Melancon enjoys a quick 1-2-3 frame, striking out Jemile Weeks for the middle out.
Athletics 6, Red Sox 1, Mid 7th -- The Sox' embarrassing offensive performance continues, as they strand a pair of leadoff batters with a ground ball out from Ryan Kalish, and strikeouts from Nick Punto and Daniel Nava, the latter coming against reliever Sean Doolittle, as Parker finally leaves the game in the seventh.
Athletics 6, Red Sox 1, End 6th -- As Mortensen's pitch count rises higher and higher, the A's finally add to their tally against the de facto long relief man. Back-to-back singles with one out and a sacrifice fly is all it takes, as Ryan Kalish makes a terrific sliding grab in center to keep the sacrifice from turning into anything further.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, Mid 6th -- The Sox waste another runner, this time a leadoff one, as Ortiz' single is erased after a Jarrod Saltalamacchia fly ball by an Adrian Gonzalez double play. This just has not been Boston's night at the plate.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, End 5th -- Clayton Mortensen is now through four innings out of the pen, with the only damage against him coming from Daisuke Matsuzaka's baserunners. It was stuff like this which had the organization considering a role change for Mortensen before he had to come back up to the major league pen.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, Mid 5th -- The hard contact keeps coming for the Red Sox, but so do the perfectly-placed fielders for the Athletics. It's a lament all-too-familiar to Red Sox fans who just lived through a very frustrating series against the Seattle Mariners.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, End 4th -- Mortensen works around another walk with a bit of help from Jarrod Saltalamacchia, who guns down Cliff Pennington to end the inning.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, Mid 4th -- The back-end of the lineup can't cash in on the strong start from the middle-of-the-order, as an Adrian Gonzalez single and Cody Ross walk are wasted by a pair of ground balls from Ryan Kalish an Mike Aviles in a scoreless fourth.
Althetics 5, Red Sox 1, End 3rd -- Clayton Mortensen enjoys a 1-2-3 inning, thus adding himself to the pool of players ready to take all of Daisuke's future starts.
It's a big pool.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, Mid 3rd -- The Sox have something of an unjust inning, as the three hardest hit balls go for outs--two line drives hit right at outfielders start the inning, and a fast ground ball from David Ortiz goes into the shift to end it--while Dustin Pedroia cues a ground ball up the middle that ends up going for a seeing-eye single. Still, all that really matters is the zero on the scoreboard.
Athletics 5, Red Sox 1, End 2nd -- And just like that, after an encouraging start in his last outing, Daisuke Matsuzaka completely falls to pieces. Throwing in the high 80s with no deception, Matsuzaka surrenders a double to Seth Smith, walks Derek Norris, and then offers up a total meatball to Brandon Moss, who takes him predictably deep to right. Matsuzaka gives up another pair of no-out baserunners before being pulled for Clayton Mortensen, who walks the first batter he faces before getting a pop-up, sacrifice fly, and ground ball to limit the damage to just the one additional run.
Red Sox 1, Athletics 1, Mid 2nd -- The second inning goes better for Jarrod Parker, who enjoys a 1-2-3 frame with a pair of ground outs. One hopes this isn't a matter of a young pitcher being allowed to settle in after a shaky start.
Red Sox 1, Athletics 1, End 1st -- One bad pitch makes for a mediocre first for Daisuke. A straight fastball down the middle is not what you want to offer to Josh Reddick, but Daisuke does just that, and Reddick puts a solo shot in the middle of three outs.
Red Sox 1, Athletics 0, Mid 1st -- The Red Sox jump out to an early lead on a pair of quick hits. Daniel Nava takes the third pitch of the game and hits a ringing double to right field, and Pedroia goes the same way, dumping an off-speed offering up-and-away into right field for the RBI. The Sox don't take full advantage of the situation, as David Ortiz grounds into a double play behind Pedroia, but still a fast start.