BOSTON (AP) — There were few bright spots in Boston’s latest loss. One of them was Felix Doubront.

The left-hander had one of his better outings in the second half of the season but got little support as the Red Sox lost to the New York Yankees 2-0 on Thursday night.

Doubront allowed two runs on four hits in 6.1 innings. That ended a stretch of five games in which he pitched no more than five innings and gave up no fewer than four runs.

Doubront (10-9) issued two of his five walks in the fourth when the Yankees scored their first run on a sacrifice fly by Andruw Jones. He walked another in the seventh when he was charged with the second run after Junichi Tazawa gave up an RBI single to Derek Jeter.

He attributed his improvement to “preparation. Trying to think less and make better pitches.”

Still, Doubront dropped to 0-5 with a 7.38 ERA in his last eight starts.

Jeter shook off an injury to tie Willie Mays for 10th place on the career hits list, backing Phil Hughes and helping the Yankees maintain a share of the AL East lead. New York won consecutive games for the first time in a month and kept pace with the Baltimore Orioles, who completed a three-game sweep of the Tampa Bay Rays with a 3-2, 14-inning win.

Hughes (15-12) retired his first 10 batters and gave up five hits in 7.1 innings. He struck out seven, walked one and allowed just three runners past first base, ending a streak of seven straight starts in which he allowed home runs. Hughes has given up two or fewer runs in five of his last six starts.

• Who: Boston Red Sox at
Toronto Blue Jays.
• Where: Rogers Centre.
• When: 7:07 p.m. tonight.
• Starting pitchers: Boston
(Daisuke Matsuzaka 1-5) vs.
Toronto (Aaron Laffey 3-5).
• TV: NESN.

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