Seattle slows down Red Sox
SEATTLE — Bobby Madritsch pitched eight shutout innings and the Seattle Mariners ended a seven-game losing streak Thursday night with a 7-1 victory over Boston, dropping the Red Sox 3 1/2 games behind the first-place New York Yankees in the American League East.
The Yankees swept a doubleheader from Tampa Bay earlier in the day.
The Red Sox, who had won four in a row, 14 of 15, and 20 of 22, committed two errors that accounted for five unearned runs. A dropped fly ball by left fielder Manny Ramirez led to four unearned runs in the fifth.
Seattle’s Ichiro Suzuki singled off Tim Wakefield’s glove in the first inning to break his league record for singles in a season. Ichiro, who extended his hitting streak to 14 games, had 192 singles as a rookie in 2001. He also singled in the eighth and has 194 singles this season.
Ichiro went 2 for 4 to give him 229 hits. He is trying to break the major league record of 257 by George Sisler of the St. Louis Browns in 1920. Ichiro, who has 23 games left, leads the majors with a .378 batting average.
Mariners rookie Jose Lopez hit a two-run homer off Wakefield and had a pair of doubles against the knuckleballer.
But it was Madritsch (4-2) who stymied a Red Sox offense that averaged 6.7 runs in their previous 30 games. He gave up five hits, walked three and struck out five, becoming the first Mariners starter to win since Aug. 22.
Orlando Cabrera homered off Scott Atchison in the ninth to ruin Seattle’s shutout bid.
The Mariners took a 1-0 lead in the first after Ichiro’s record-tying single off Wakefield’s glove. Ichiro stole second — his 34th of the season, second in the league — and went to third on a passed ball before scoring on a throwing error by Wakefield on a pickoff attempt of Randy Winn at first. The run was unearned.
Seattle made it 3-0 in the third on Bret Boone’s RBI double and a run-scoring grounder by Greg Dobbs, making his first major league start at third base.
The Mariners expanded their lead to 7-0 with four unearned runs in the fifth after Ramirez let Dan Wilson’s fly ball go off his glove for a two-run error.
Boston’s Johnny Damon had his 11-game hitting streak snapped.