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Haren dominates as Diamondbacks edge Red Sox

Jun 24, 2008 - 4:45 AM By Mike Petraglia PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

BOSTON (Ticker) -- The Arizona Diamondbacks gave Dan Haren just enough support while the righthander gave the Boston Red Sox no such comfort.

Chris Young had two hits, including a tie-breaking double in a two-run seventh, while Haren stifled the Red Sox on two hits over seven scoreless innings as the Diamondbacks beat the Red Sox, 2-1, in the opener of a three-game interleague series at Fenway Park.

Haren (8-4) and Boston's Josh Beckett entered the game with identical 7-4 records. Both threw brilliant games from the start.

Haren retired the first six batters before allowing a double by Jason Varitek off the wall in left-center to lead off the third. Haren retired the next two batters to end Boston's only threat through six innings.

"That might have been as good of stuff as Danny's had all year, 94, 95 (miles-per-hour fastball), I don't think we've seen that all year," Diamondbacks manager Bob Melvin said. "Good breaking ball, good splitter. He threw enough cutters inside to lefties, away from righties. He elevated his fastball about as good as we've seen and he had to be that good."

Haren retired the side in order in the fourth, fifth and sixth before striking out Varitek with runners at second and third to end the seventh. Haren walked one and fanned five over his 98-pitch outing.

"I had good stuff and felt OK to start," Haren said. "It's just another place that's fun to play. The crowd gets you going big-time and a lot of adrenaline obviously. In a nothing-nothing game, every pitch means so much. I may have thrown only (98) pitches but it's a different hundred pitches than a hundred pitches in a 10-0 game."

A key moment happened just before the start of the fifth inning, when an errant practice throw across the diamond from Red Sox third baseman Mike Lowell short-hopped Kevin Youkilis and hit him in the right eye. He had to be removed from the game and replaced with Brandon Moss, who had never played the position in the majors.

"Well, I felt terrible about it," Lowell said. "I short-hopped him and I probably short-hop him five times a game in between innings. It wasn't even a hard throw. I kind of lobbed it, he went to scoop it and hit off his glove and then I saw it hit him. I thought it hit him in the side of the head but afterwards, I saw him shaken up and touching his eye."

A CT scan on Youkilis turned out negative and he is expected to make a full recovery.

"I was just hoping it didn't hit him in the eye but he got a pretty big shiner pretty quick," Lowell said. "I'm just glad that they said he had all these tests and they said he's going to be fine."

Arizona could not capitalize on doubles from Orlando Hudson in the first and Justin Upton in the third but finally broke through in the seventh.

Following a leadoff walk to Conor Jackson, Mark Reynolds singled to left. Young doubled off the wall in left, scoring Jackson from second.

"Both guys threw the ball real well," Varitek said. "Josh threw the ball as well as he has all year. We probably made a (pitch) selection error on one pitch and it was a double that cost us a run."

Moss, filling in for Youkilis, then mishandled Chris Snyder's grounder to first, allowing Reynolds to score from third to make it 2-0.

"That was pretty much a candy hop that I got," Moss said. "It couldn't have been an easier ground ball to field. I just took my eyes off of it and saw the runner taking off for home and tried to do too much too soon. It's a shame it turned out the way it did. That's my responsibility right there."

Beckett (7-5) allowed just the two runs and five hits with two walks and eight strikeouts over eight innings.

"He's tough," Beckett said of Haren. "It doesn't matter who he's pitching against, he's tough. It seems like we've won a lot of those games. Obviously, it's a little more fun when you end up on the winning end."

"I respect him a lot as a baseball player and more as a person," Haren said of Boston's ace. "He's got unbelievable stuff if you ask the guys in here. The guy has won a lot of games in his career and he's the ace of their staff. It's fun going up against him. If I were to pick, I wouldn't go up against him. I'd rather face their No. 5 guy, whoever that is."

Tony Pena pitched the eighth and surrendered a run on J.D. Drew's sacrifice fly with the bases loaded but got Manny Ramirez to line out to third to end the threat. Former Red Sox reliever Brandon Lyon worked the ninth for his 16th save.

The game was delayed 32 minutes at the start by rain, the third time in four games the Red Sox have had a game delayed on their six-game homestand.