Top Ten Blue Jays’ Home
Openers
#6: 2008 vs Boston Red
Sox
 |
| Jays' second baseman Aaron Hill |
This is the only game on the Top
Ten list in recent memory, and in fact, the only of two after the
strike-shortened season of 1994. That’s because in the last 20 years, most of
the home openers have either been losses or rather boring, blowout victories.
The 2008 game played on Friday evening, April 4th, 2008, however,
was an exception.
The Jays welcomed the defending
World Series Champion Boston Red Sox to the Rogers Centre. Shaun Marcum got the
starting assignment on the hill for Toronto while the Sox would go with
knuckleballer Tim Wakefield.
Both pitchers were brilliant
early on as the teams combined for three hits and no runs after five innings.
After Marcum got the Boston hitters one-two-three in the top of the sixth, the
Jays finally got to Wakefield. Canadian Matt Stairs drilled the second pitch
that Wakefield threw in the sixth over the right field wall to give the Jays a
1-0 lead. Later in the inning, RBI singles by Lyle Overbay and Aaron Hill would
make the score 3-0 before the sixth was over.
In the top of the seventh,
however, the Red Sox tied it when J.D. Drew drilled a three-run homer off of
Marcum. But the Jays regained the lead in the bottom of the inning when Frank
Thomas doubled to centre, scoring David Eckstein and Shannon Stewart: Jays-5,
Sox-3.
Toronto added an insurance run
in the eighth when Eckstein singled in Hill. Jeremy Accardo would pitch the
ninth and pick up the save as the Jays won the game 6-3, Marcum picking up the
win after pitching seven innings, surrendering three runs on three hits and a
walk, while striking out eight.
For the Jays, Overbay, Hill and
Marco Scutaro had multi-hit games, while six different players scored the runs.
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