April 29, 2008: Kevin Youkilis handles 16 error-free chances at first base, hits walk-off single for Red Sox

From July 5, 2006, through June 6, 2008, Kevin Youkilis played 238 games at first base for the Boston Red Sox without committing an error. He handled a league record 2,379 consecutive error-free chances. The stretch included every one of his 135 games in 2007, also an American League record. He successfully handled 1,080 chances that year at first base and received a Gold Glove Award.1

Youkilis’ busiest day of his errorless streak was on July 9, 2006, with 20 chances. The Red Sox lost that game, 6-5—in 19 innings to the White Sox in Chicago. Youkilis was 0-for-5 at the plate but drew four walks and scored twice.

Another game when Youkilis handled many chances flawlessly—16 in all—was on April 29, 2008. He not only helped to prevent the visiting Toronto Blue Jays from scoring but also won the game, 1-0, with a walkoff single in the ninth inning.

Starting for Terry Francona’s Red Sox in the Tuesday night game was left-hander Jon Lester. Boston, coming off a World Series championship in 2007, had lost five games in a row, including a two-hit 3-0 loss to James Shields and the Tampa Bay Rays two days earlier. Though on his way to a 16-6 (3.21 ERA) season, the 24-year-old Lester was struggling in April and entered the game 1-2 with a 5.40 ERA. He kept the Blue Jays hitless in the first four innings, walking one batter in the second and another in the fourth.

Toronto right-hander Roy Halladay was more than midway through his Hall of Fame career. The 30-year-old right-hander had a 2-3 record, including a 7-4 win over Boston on April 6, and he had given up four or more runs in three of his five starts. In the first four innings, Halladay allowed only one Red Sox batter to reach base—Kevin Youkilis, who slapped a one-out grounder to the left of diving shortstop David Eckstein in the bottom of the second. Youkilis stole second base but remained there.

Lyle Overbay got Toronto’s first hit, a single to lead off the fifth, but was erased on Lester’s next pitch, when Shannon Stewart hit onto a 6-4-3 double play.

Red Sox right fielder Brandon Moss singled in the bottom of the fifth on a little dribbler toward third fielded by catcher Gregg Zaun, but Moss never got past first base.2

Zaun drew a four-pitch base on balls to lead off the sixth, but a strikeout and a 6-3 double play cut short any further advance. Each of Boston’s three batters in the bottom of the inning grounded out, short to first.

Lester walked Aaron Hill with two outs in the seventh. Overbay followed with a fly ball to the warning track in right-center, but it was hauled in by Moss for the third out—the game’s only putout by a Red Sox outfielder. Halladay retired the Red Sox in order: David Ortiz on a groundout, Manny Ramírez on a strikeout, and Youkilis on a 4-3 groundout. The game remained scoreless—and error-free.

Lester struck out the first two batters in the top of the eighth, then got Zaun to ground out, third to first. Halladay got the first two outs in the bottom of the inning, then saw Jason Varitek single up the middle for just the third Red Sox hit. But Julio Lugo struck out to strand Varitek.

Francona had Jonathan Papelbon relieve Lester, who had given up just one hit, walked four, and thrown 97 pitches. NESN broadcaster Jerry Remy praised Lester’s outing, guessing they just wanted to have him depart knowing he’d pitched well, while also getting Papelbon some work.3 Papelbon not pitched for a full week, since April 22.

Papelbon struck out Álex Ríos and pinch-hitter Matt Stairs, but Scott Rolen doubled to left-center, one-hopping the wall. It was the first time Toronto had gotten a man as far as second base. Vernon Wells grounded out—second baseman Dustin Pedroia made a diving catch to his right, then threw to Youkilis, who booked his 16th putout of the game. The Toronto Star called Pedroia’s effort “a dazzling defensive play.”4 After the game, Wells called Pedroia “Superman at second base.”5 Pedroia’s play “left him with a left shoulder that popped out of its socket,”6 but he was able to play the very next night.

The game went to the bottom of the ninth, still scoreless. Halladay was under 100 pitches, and Blue Jays manager John Gibbons sent him back to the mound. The first two Red Sox were retired, but then up came Ortiz who banged one into the upper seats in right field—but foul. Ortiz drew a walk, the first of the game off Halladay. Ramírez lifted a single into straightaway center field, Ortiz stopping at second base.

Youkilis—who had come into the game hitless in his last 14 at-bats—looked at ball one, then lined a single to center, his second hit of the game. The field was wet and the air was cold. Wells came in to grab the ball on the second bounce and throw home while Ortiz (favoring a sore knee) rounded third base, per the Toronto Star, “in painful slow motion. Wells angled for the throw but before he could glove the ball it glanced off his wrist. Ortiz waltzed in for the 1-0 win. The sellout crowd went nuts.”7  

It was the first run the Red Sox had scored in 22 1/3 innings.8 It was also the Red Sox’ first 1-0 walkoff win since July 18, 1980, when Dave Stapleton hit a solo home run to beat the Minnesota Twins.

The Red Sox won another one-run game the very next day, edging the Blue Jays, 2-1. It was another walkoff, this time on a single by Varitek.

After his walkoff hit on April 29, Youkilis predicted, “Halladay is going to be a Hall of Fame pitcher. He’s so unique in today’s game….It’s fun facing him because you just know you’re going to be against one of the great competitors in the game. So you battle and battle. Sometimes he gets you; other times you get him, but he’s always a challenge.”9 Halladay finished the season with a 20-11 record and was runner-up in the AL Cy Young Award voting to Cliff Lee of the Cleveland Indians.

On June 7, the Red Sox were hosting the Seattle Mariners. Boston led, 6-2, after seven innings. Youkilis had been playing third base, Sean Casey working at first base. In the top of the eighth, Francona brought Mike Lowell into the game for defensive reasons. He took over at third base. Youkilis was moved to first base and Casey left the game. In the bottom of the eighth, the Red Sox scored five more runs, two of them driven in by a Lowell double to center and then two more driven in by a Youkilis double to center.

The Mariners entered the ninth down 11-2, with Papelbon coming in to close. First up was pinch-hitter Willie Bloomquist. He grounded a ball to second baseman Álex Cora, who threw to first base. But Youkilis failed to make the catch: “I turned real quick. I didn’t see it. I dropped it.”10  E-3. Bloomquist was safe, and the streak was over. He later scored, but with the only run of the inning and Boston won, 11-3.

In 613 games at first base in his 10-season career, Youkilis was charged with just 13 errors. As of 2025, his .997 career fielding percentage at first ranks second in major-league history behind Casey Kotchman.

Author’s Note

Only regular-season games counted for Youkilis’ errorless streak. In 2007 the Red Sox played 14 postseason games, with Youkilis at first base in each one. There he proved mortal. In AL Championship Series Game Four, at Cleveland’s Jacobs Field, Youkilis committed an error in the bottom of the sixth, dropping a pickoff throw. The Indians won, 7-3, to take a three-games-to-one lead in the series. The Red Sox came back to win the next seven games, taking the ALCS and then sweeping the Colorado Rockies in the World Series. In the 2007 postseason, Youkilis hit .388 with 10 RBIs.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Larry DeFillipo and copy-edited by John Fredland.

Photo credit: Kevin Youkilis, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, Retrosheet.org, and YouTube.com. Thanks to Adrian Fung for supplying coverage of the game from Toronto newspapers.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS200804290.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/2008/B04290BOS2008.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrjoX5NLE5k

Notes

1 Not as adept at third base in 2007, he had committed three errors in only 38 chances.

2 Moss replaced J. D. Drew, who had left the game after suffering a left quadriceps injury in the second inning when running to first base. Drew departed after the end of the third inning.

3 Lester had yet to pitch a complete game, though later in 2008 he threw two shutouts. This was Halladay’s fourth complete game of 2008 alone, but he had lost three of the four.

4 Cathal Kelly, “Complete frustration for Halladay,” Toronto Star, April 30, 2008: S1.

5 Jeff Blair, “Toronto squanders Halladay gem,” Toronto Globe and Mail, April 30, 2008: S5.

6 Amalie Benjamin, “Formula One,” Boston Globe, April 30, 2008: D1.

7 Kelly, S9.

8 They hadn’t had an extra-base hit for 33 innings.

9 Nick Cafardo and Amalie Benjamin, “After nicking Halladay, Youkilis tips his cap,” Boston Globe, April 30, 2008: D5.

10 Gordon Edes, “After Ramírez homers, the rest is easy for Sox,” Boston Globe, June 8, 2008: D1, D14.