Buchholz emerging as Sox ace

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BALTIMOREBobby Valentine wants to find the Major LeagueBaseball black market and get into the Buchholz business. After watching Clay Buchholz recover from a shaky first twoinnings to go eight strong frames and earn his 11th win of theseason in a 6-3 victory for the Sox over the Orioles at Camden Yards, the Soxmanagers cup runneth over with praise. Hes pitching as well as anyone in the league. I can tellyou that much, said Valentine. Its something youd like to bottle and sellon the street corner.If Valentine did bottle up whatever Buchholz has been doingright in the second half of the year while winning seven of his past eightdecisions, hed have people lining up around the block ready to pay whateverprice. Early on, it looked like it wasnt going to be his night when he wasleaving all his pitches high in the zone, and the Orioles were teeing off. Adam Jones touched him up for a two-run double in the firstthat gave Baltimore a quick lead on the Sox, and Mark Reynolds continuedhis hot-hitting against Boston by slamming an opposite field homer onthe first pitch of the second. There was more trouble in the second whena walk and two hits set up a play at home plate, but Omar Quintanilla was hosedat home plate by Cody Ross with a throw from right field. That curbed the Os attack and gave Buchholz exactly what heneeded to slide into a comfortable groove. He allowed only two hits the six innings andstruck out six while shutting down the Baltimore offense. Even moreimpressive than that he became only the 47th pitcher in Major LeagueBaseball history to strike out the side on nine pitches when he fanned Adam Jones, MattWieters and Chris Dave on nothing but strikes. Just as impressive, he did it against the best that Baltimore has to offer for offensive performers. Buchholzclowned them with his four-seam fastball, two-seam fastball and cutter. He was just spotting and throwing hard. He was mixing andjust went after it. He had his command going for him," catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia said. "It doesnt happen oftento a good-hitting team like that and the heart of their lineup. Thatsimpressive to do. It just shows you how good he is and how deceptive he canbe.Buchholz said it was probably the first time since juniorcollege that hed accomplished the feat. I didnt even know that was the case, said Buchholz.Starting off the game it was a lot of hard stuff, and I think that was theinning we threw in a few curveballs. I was just trying to keep em off balance.I definitely wasnt trying to strike them all out.The bottom line is Buchholz has been Bostons savior in thesecond half. Where exactly would they be without his 1.53 ERA in 47innings over his last six starts, and his major league-best 2.08 ERA since May27?Nobody wants to know, and the Sox are just glad hes the guythat keeps stepping up and stopping losing streaks. Hes now 9-2 in 18 startsfollowing a Red Sox loss since the beginning of the 2011 season. Every game from here on out is a big win. It doesnt matterwho were playing, said Buchholz. Its something where we have to try to geton a run and spin off seven, eight or nine games in a row to get us back in themix.Hopefully tonight was a nice step in that direction beingdown and then coming back against a good club.Thats the exact kind of resiliency and urgency the rest ofthe Sox are going to need if theyre going to show any kind of bounce over thefinal month-plus of the regular season. Its getting close to an impossibilitythat its going to happen with each loss on their ledger, but Buchholz is oneof the few guys thats consistently part of the solution rather than theproblem.

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