Last night was Kansas City Royals ace Zach Greinke's only chance to play against the Red Sox this season and boy did he live up to the hype.
Greinke (15-8) threw six innings of shutout, two-hit ball. He walked three and struck out five, leaving his ERA at 2.08. In the American League especially and on such a crappy team, that is nothing short of incredible.
He has gotten hype all season after an amazing start but he slowed down in the middle of the season, as the Royals started their annual collapse.
Still, Greinke has picked his game back up and he deserves the award much more than C.C. Sabathia, Justin Verlander or Roy Halladay.
The Royals (63-88) put it away in the first-something that's probably never been written in the last 20 years-as they scored five runs off Paul Byrd.
Nothing was hit hard but Kansas City scored on a bases-loaded walk, an RBI single, ground out and a two-run single.
Boston (89-61) only managed two hits in the entire game: a double by Dustin Pedroia (extending his hitting streak to 14 games) and a single by Victor Martinez in the sixth (putting his hit streak at 21 games).
Jacoby Ellsbury scored on Martinez's ground out in the eighth and the Sox had two guys on in the ninth but couldn't push across any more runs. Royals closer Joakim Soria only needed one pitch to record his 29th save of the season.
After losing the first two games of the series, Boston looks to bounce back tonight with Josh Beckett against Luke Hochevar. A vintage Beckett performance would be nice since he'll only have a few more starts before the games really matter (ie. in October).
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