(Let’s pretend like I haven’t ignored the blog and all of my five readers for the past two months, deal?)

Anybody remember this quote from Tito on August 17th before Clay Buchholz’s first start?

Doesn’t matter if he throws a no-hitter, he’s going back down. If he throws a no-hitter, we may send him back with a present — but he’s going back.

It’s a good thing that the Pawtuckett season is just about over, otherwise Tito was going to have to give Clay keys to a new car rather than a plane ticket to get back to Rhode Island.

Sox fans have been regaled with stories of the amazing Clay Buchholz, and he certainly didn’t disappoint in his second major league start. He pitched a complete game, shutout and did not allowing a single hit to the Baltimore Orioles in 115 pitches. I turned the game on in the 2nd inning and got to watch Buchholz put on a clinic. He had a good fastball (90-94mph), a changeup that consistently baffled the Oriole hitters and just for good measure he would throw in a 12-6 curveball. Varitek would put down a sign, Clay nodded and Tek would barely need to move his glove. Lather, rinse, repeat 114 more times and you’ve got yourself the recipe for a major league no hitter.

Pedroia clearly saved the no-no in the seventh with a diving stop and quick throw to rob Tejada. I’m not quite sure why Tejada tried to slide into first, but it made the call a little bit easier for the umpire. In five years nobody but Buchholz will remember how the no-hitter was inches away from being a one-hitter. I just hope that Dustin Pedroia is never allowed to pay for another round when he hangs out with Clay.

With an 8-0 lead going into the bottom of the 8th, the Sox scored 2 more runs at an absurdly slow pace. Which got me to thinking, if you have an 8-0 lead, why not just strike out and let your pitcher get back on the mound? He’s obviously in a rhythm, do you really need to pad your stats?

But Buchholz came back in the 9th to strike out Roberts on a great high fastball, got Patterson to fly to the black hole in centerfield known as Coco Crisp and fittingly got Nick Markakis looking on a beautiful curveball. One small fist pump and before he knew it he was being simultaneously picked up by Tek and jumped on by Papi. If the Sox are lucky his spine is still intact.

A quick side note: apparently Tito had to call Theo in the 7th to see if Buchholz could go past his pitch count. Obviously Tito was given the green light. However, Theo also gave him a hard deadline of 120 pitches. Just imagine, if anybody besides Jay Payton and his 3.18 P/PA (3rd lowest in the ML) was batting 9th, Buchholz may have got 8 2/3 of no-hit ball.

All said it was an amazing performance by the 23 year-old Texan. He also became only the second pitcher to pitch a no hitter in his second start. The other was Wilson Alvarez on 8/11/91 with your nine year old Dirty Watah blogger in attendance. Ironically, it was also against the Orioles.