Red Sox Break Out With 3 Homers To End 6-Game Skid

Scoring runs isn't so tough after all.

The Red Sox needed just the first 10 pitches to take a two-run lead Monday night after scoring just twice in their previous three games.

"No one cares that we didn't score for, I don't even know how long it was, 34 innings or whatever the heck it was," Dustin Pedroia said after a 6-5 win over the Detroit Tigers stopped Boston's season-worst six-game losing streak. "There's a lot of numbers to this game and that can mess you up, so we're just out playing and trying to have fun."

The Red Sox didn't have much fun in the last three games of a 3-6 road trip.

They didn't score for the first 31 innings of those three games. Then, after Victor Martinez broke that streak with a two-run homer that gave them a 2-1 lead in the eighth, the New York Yankees rallied to win 5-2 Sunday night.

Boston squandered another lead Monday, going from 4-0 to 5-5, before Nick Green hit a sacrifice fly for the go-ahead run in the seventh.

"It's definitely a sense of relief," Green said. "We've been on such a roller coaster the last week."

Pedroia's ninth homer of the year followed Jacoby Ellsbury's leadoff double in the first. Green hit his sixth homer in a two-run second that made it 4-0. Jason Bay added another solo shot, his 22nd homer, giving Boston a 5-3 lead in the fifth.

Detroit tied it in the seventh on Placido Polanco's RBI single and Marcus Thames' run-scoring double. Ramon Ramirez (6-3) got in trouble in the eighth before Jonathan Papelbon got the last four outs for his 28th save in 31 opportunities.

Zach Miner (5-2) took the loss and starter Edwin Jackson remained winless in Fenway Park (0-4) despite having an outstanding season.

"They've been struggling a bit offensively," Detroit manager Jim Leyland said. "I think they just obviously made up their mind, `Hey, he's going to be aggressive, we're going to be aggressive with him."'

In their previous three games, the Red Sox totaled just two runs and 17 hits — 16 singles and a homer.

Boston moved within 51/2 games of the AL East leading Yankees, who lost to Toronto on Monday, and moved 1/2 game ahead of idle Texas in the wild-card race.

"We desperately needed to find a way to win a game," Red Sox manager Terry Francona said, "and we did."