Another ninth-inning win for Red Sox

BOSTON - The Red Sox can afford to forget that Jonathan Papelbon blew a three-run lead and cost Clay Buchholz a well-earned win. These days, nothing before the bottom of the ninth matters in Boston.

For the second straight day, the Red Sox rallied against a depleted Detroit bullpen for a walk-off win, beating the Tigers, 4-3, Sunday when pitcher Robbie Weinhardt threw away Marco Scutaro's bunt and allowed the winning run to score. "It's not the way we wanted to win," said Eric Patterson, who walked in the ninth to move the winning run into scoring position. "But we got it done. It doesn't matter."

Papelbon (4-4) got the victory despite giving up Miguel Cabrera's two-run double and a game-tying single by Jhonny Peralta in the ninth.

Brad Thomas (4-1) pitched a scoreless eighth, then gave up Jed Lowrie's single to lead off the ninth and walked Patterson before Weinhardt came on to relieve him. Scutaro laid down a bunt to the third-base side and Weinhardt fielded it, but his throw to first was far wide to the infield side of the bag for an error.

Scutaro, credited with a single, raised his hands when he saw the ball roll up the line in front of him, and for the second game in a row, the Red Sox celebrated a victory in their last at-bat.

David Ortiz hit a game-ending three-run double Saturday; in both games, the Tigers were without closer Jose Valverde, who threw 60 pitches Friday night in a game Detroit had led 6-1. In the three-game series, the Red Sox scored eight ninth-inning runs.

"I forgot about yesterday," Boston manager Terry Francona said. "It seemed like a long time ago."

The Red Sox were coasting behind Buchholz, who outpitched fellow All-Star Justin Verlander and took a two-hit shutout into the ninth. But Will Rhymes led off the inning with a bad-hop single and Ryan Raburn walked to bring up Cabrera. He lined Papelbon's first pitch off the centerfield wall.

"This was kind of a weird game. We looked like we didn't have much of a shot, [then] got back into it," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. " . . . They're playing their fannies off. We're just playing well enough to get beat, and that's not good."