News / Sports
Dice-K Carves Up Royals Bats in Debut as Boston Red Sox Win
Daisuke Matsuzaka lived up to his nickname, Dice-K, in his major league debut Thursday afternoon. The 26-year-old Japanese import struck out 10 over seven strong innings and earned the win as the Boston Red Sox (2-1) knocked off the Kansas City Royals (1-2) 4-1 to claim the three-game series two games to one.
Matsuzaka gave up a first inning single to leadoff man David DeJesus but got Estaban German to ground into a fielder’s choice for his first out. After walking Matt Teahen put runners on first and second Dice-K induced a double-play grounder from Emil Brown to end the inning.
Boston’s prized rookie didn’t get his first strike out until two were gone in the bottom of the second. Matsuzaka threw two straight balls to Ross Gload before setting him down with three straight strikes. John Buck went down looking in the third and the hard throwing right hander struck out the side in the fourth.
In the sixth inning Matsuzaka gave up a leadoff homer to DeJesus and German followed with a single up the middle. Matsuzaka then caught Teahen looking and German was thrown out trying to steal second. With two down Brown doubled before Dice-K recorded his eighth K catching Alex Gordon looking.
In the bottom of the seventh Dice-K got Ryan Shealy and Gload swinging for his ninth and tenth strikeout and finished up his outing with a fly ball out off the bat of Buck.
Matsuzaka left after seven complete innings with a 2-1 lead courtesy of an RBI double from Manny Ramirez in the first and a throwing error from Royals catcher John Buck that scored Julio Lugo.
Boston tacked on two more in the top of the eight as David Ortiz scored on a wild pitch and J.D. Drew came around to score on a Coco Crisp single.
Jonathan Papelbon pitched a perfect ninth inning, striking out two to get the save.
