TORONTO – The Boston Red Sox punished R.A. Dickey’s knuckleball en route to an 8-4 win Saturday afternoon as the Toronto Blue Jays wasted a two-homer performance by Jose Bautista to lose their fourth straight.
Hanley Ramirez’s triple, which bounced over Bautista’s head in right field in the fifth inning, gave Boston a 6-4 lead it never yielded with Toronto going down in order the last three innings.
Dustin Pedroia also drove in two Red Sox runs and made a sparkling fielding play to rob Ryan Goins of a single in the sixth before a Rogers Centre sellout of 47,138.
Boston (3-1) has now scored 28 runs in four games this season, including 16 in two outings against Toronto.
After three poor performances by the bullpen, Toronto (2-4) was done in by Dickey’s dancing pitch which may have been too unpredictable on the day.
The 41-year-old needed just 21 pitches to take care of the first two innings – and 80 for the next three. Two Josh Thole passed balls, a wild pitch, errant pickoff attempt and eight hits didn’t help as he faced 26 hitters over those five innings.
Dickey (1-1) did not make it to the sixth, leaving after yielding seven runs (six earned) with two walks and nine strikeouts. Of his 101 pitches, only 60 were strikes.
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