With his biggest night since opening day, Ichiro Suzuki reached yet another milestone.
Suzuki topped 2,500 hits for his major league career, going 4-for-5 with two RBIs in the Seattle Mariners' 12-9 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks in 10 innings on Tuesday.
With a single up the middle in the first, Suzuki, who turns 39 in October, became the fourth fastest in history to achieve the feat after George Sisler, doing it in his 1,817th game.
Suzuki also has 1,278 hits from his nine-year Japanese career with the Orix BlueWave, giving him a total of 3,781 on both sides of the Pacific. He is the 95th player in the majors with 2,500 hits for his career.
"I was there when (former All-Star Roberto) Alomar got his 2,500th hit, and I remember thinking at the time that it was an astronomical figure," Suzuki said. "So to have come this far means something to me."
Suzuki said you're only as good as your last game.
"In the world I live in, the 2,400 hits or whatever I had before did nothing for me in today's game," he said. "You can only enjoy days like this just at that moment."
And even though he's back from surgery, Dice-K is still struggling:
Matsuzaka struggles again though Reds Sox win
BOSTON, June 22 (16:51) Kyodo
Daisuke Matsuzaka made his third start of the season for the Red Sox on Thursday as another former Japan veteran, Scott Atchison, collected the victory in relief for Boston.
Matsuzaka gave up three runs in the first and allowed the Miami Marlins to untie the score in the sixth, but the Red Sox came back for a 6-5 victory and a series sweep of the Marlins at Fenway Park.
"I was lame," said the 31-year-old right-hander, who gave up four runs in 5-1/3 innings and who needs one win to reach 50 in the majors. "I can't think of any other word to say except 'frustrating'."
As he had in his previous start, Matsuzaka had trouble getting started. He surrendered a leadoff single in the first, and the Marlins set the table by putting runners on second and third with one out.
Matsuzaka got cleanup hitter Logan Morrison to look at strike three, but the next two batters singled to make it 3-0, and the right-hander had to throw 33 pitches before his teammates got a chance to bat against Marlins right-hander Carlos Zambrano.
"I regret throwing that one pitch," said Matsuzaka, who was making just his third start since having elbow surgery in June 2011. "I'm having a hard time gauging my condition. There are times when I'm pitching that I'm lost."
The Red Sox's three-game sweep was their first at Fenway since July 2011, but Matsuzaka is anything but euphoric.
"I feel should be able to come out strong at the start and just keep it up, but that has proven to be very elusive."
Matsuzaka's most effective pitch on Thursday was his fastball, while his slider, a principal weapon of his days with the Seibu Lions, has all but disappeared from his game.
"It's gotten to the point that I need to do something about that [the slider]," he said. "I am getting neither the movement nor velocity I want to see out of it."
More like Dice-K still being Dice-K, he has always been an inconsistent pitcher. But the Sox are so bad this year, that they're calling his outings "good."
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