Red Sox pound Blue Jays to open series

Toronto, ON (Sports Network) - Clay Buchholz went a season-high eight innings, David Ortiz and Adrian Gonzalez both drove in a pair and the Red Sox defeated the Blue Jays, 7-2, in the opener of a three-game series.

Buchholz (5-2) also reached a season-high in strikeouts, with seven, and gave up just two runs -- on homers to Yunel Escobar and David Cooper. He yielded six hits and walked a pair.

Ortiz had a solo homer, Gonzalez went 3-for-5 and Daniel Nava hit three doubles for Boston, which has won 15 of its last 21 games.

Henderson Alvarez (3-5) took the loss for Toronto, which was coming off a three-game sweep of the Orioles. He allowed four runs on eight hits over 6 1/3 innings.

Ortiz's 13th homer of the season -- a towering leadoff blast which barely cleared the wall in left-center field -- put the Red Sox on top in the second.

It was 2-0 an inning later when Nava ripped a two-out double and crossed the plate on Gonzalez's single to left.

The Blue Jays' first hit came in the bottom half, when Escobar belted a two- out homer to left-center. They placed runners at first and second in the fifth inning but a Kelly Johnson strikeout and a 6-4-3 double play groundout by Escobar promptly ended the threat.

The Red Sox loaded the bases in the sixth and only came away with one run -- on Jarrod Saltalamacchia's fielder's choice groundout -- but scored four in the seventh to put the game away.

Ryan Sweeney led off with a ground-rule double, moved to third on a groundout and scored on Scott Podsednik's two-out single off of Luis Perez. Nava plated Podsednik with a double before Gonzalez and Ortiz laced consecutive RBI singles to make it 7-1.

Cooper hit his first homer of the season in the home half to cap the scoring.