Johnny Damon strikes out against Hideki Okajima to end the top of the eighth inning Wednesday night.

Journal photo / Ruben W. Perez

BOSTON -- When the always reserved Hideki Okajima shows any kind of emotion on the mound, it can only mean good things for the Red Sox.

The Sox' lefty reliever did a few outstanding things against the Yankees Wednesday night at Fenway Park. Basically, he was unhittable. Okajima worked 1 1/3 scoreless innings and did not allow a hit, while walking one with three strikeouts.

With the Sox holding a one-run lead and a runner on second in the top of the eighth inning, he struck out Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon to secure Boston's slim advantage. When he threw strike three past Damon, Okajima pounded his mitt with his fist.

"I was excited because I was able to get out of the jam," he said. "I am very satisfied with the way I threw. My command was good and my changeup was good - everything was working fine."

Okajima entered the game with two outs in the seventh inning after reliever Ramon Ramirez had already surrendered back-to-back solo homers to Damon and Mark Teixeira.

New York was still threatening when Posada hit a two-out single. That was the end of the night for Ramirez as Francona brought Okajima to face the always-dangerous Hideki Matsui.

Okajima won the battle over his former Japanese teammate with a strikeout.

"It doesn't matter who it is, I just go out there and get the hitters out," Okajima said.

Okajima continued to dominate in the eighth inning after he issued a leadoff walk to Nick Swisher. Brett Gardner was inserted as a pinch-runner, and reached second on a sacrifice bunt by Melky Cabrera. The Sox' southpaw settled down and struck out Jeter and Damon to end the threat and the inning.

"It was huge for Okajima to get those two strikeouts there in the eighth with a runner on," said Red Sox starter Tim Wakefield, who improves to 8-3.

Okajima said he didn't expect to face the right-handed hitting Jeter to begin with given the matchup. Francona could have gone with Jonathan Papelbon, who dealt with a bout of food poisoning the last two days, or Takashi Saito, but the manager stuck with Okajima.

He accepted the challenge.

"I wanted to show what I can do," he said. "And I was able to get the hitters out, and I'm very happy about it. More importantly, I didn't want to erase Wakefield's 'W' because he was so good."

While Papelbon recorded his 15th save of the season, he put all the spotlight on Okajima's outing.

"By far, no questions asked, Hideki was our star of the game. He came in and basically took over the ballgame and did what he did," Papelbon said. "That's the big reason we won the game tonight -- no doubt about it. He pitched great tonight."

jmcdonal@projo.com