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THE BEST RED SOX TEAM EVAH! ...
J.D. Martinez slugs 2 HRs to tie Mookie
May 20, 2018
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The Red
Sox did their job and that finished the job
for this series. This was an all-around effort as the offense scored
five runs on home runs, including two from J.D.
Martinez, and got production up and down the
lineup. The pitching staff, led by Eduardo
Rodriguez, allowed a lot of hits but they
were all singles and the Orioles couldn’t
sequence them well enough to score even one run. The Sox headed into
this series looking to take at least three of the four games in this
series, and that’s exactly what they did.
Rodriguez had
a really strong outing, but the offense and the dinger party that has ensued
over the last couple of days was the story here. While the final tally was a
nice one for the Red Sox offense, the early parts of the game were pretty
lackluster against David
Hess, making just the second major-league start of his
career. They were certainly looking for a big start and an early lead, but they
went down in order in the first inning. The second inning changed that, with
Martinez’ first homer of the game. He got an inside fastball for the first pitch
of that at bat and the slugger pushed it out to right field and hooked it around
Pesky’s Pole for a solo shot, giving the Red Sox a 1-0 lead. the Sox would get
two more baserunners in the inning, but they’d ultimately be stranded on the
corners.
The third inning also showed some promise as Mookie
Betts just missed a home run out to left-center field,
instead having to settle for a double high off the Monster to lead off the
frame. The next three batters would go down in order, however, stranding the
runner in scoring position.
After a 1-2-3 fourth, the score was still only 1-0 heading
into the fifth, but Hess lost
control of the game and the Red Sox showed off their muscles here. Although
there were a couple of homers in this inning, perhaps the most encouraging part
of the rally was what started it, when Jackie
Bradley Jr. ripped a double down the right field line
on one of his best swings of the season. He was rewarded, too, because two
batters later Andrew
Benintendi would come up and continue his torrid pace
by launching a middle-in fastball into the bullpen for a two-run shot. 3-0 Red
Sox. Mitch Moreland followed that up with a ground-rule double into the right
field corner, giving Martinez another chance to shine. He waited for the second
pitch this time around, taking another middle-in fastball and sending it way out
to straightaway center field. That was his second homer of the day, and it tied
him for the major-league lead on the season with Betts.
The Sox would get two more baserunners, but left the inning with the 5-0 lead.
As all of this was going on, Rodriguez was putting together
an impressive performance of his own. It’s easy to look at the Orioles record
and assume their offense is bad. They do have plenty of holes to be exploited,
but this is also a lineup that is capable of doing damage against anyone and
they’ve been doing that plenty of late. Rodriguez had some of his best stuff of
the year here, however, and he was mixing in all of his pitches. The fastball
was still the focus, as always, but he showed off his slider, cutter and
changeup throughout the day.
Through the first few innings, he didn’t have any perfect
runs through the order, but he also never really found himself in major trouble.
In each of the first two innings he allowed one single, but the runner never
advanced beyond first base. The third was a bit shakier as he allowed a pair of
one-out singles, but a pop up and a ground ball ended the threat with a goose
egg still on the board for the O’s. The fourth would go similarly as he’d again
allow a pair of runners, but neither scored. One of those runners reached on an
error, however, as Rafael
Devers made another miscue in the field. This was
another instance of the young third baseman aggressively charging in on a ball
he likely could have played more patiently and still gotten the out.
The fifth was the best inning of the day for the lefty,
particularly since it came against the top of Baltimore’s lineup. Rodriguez did
allow another single in this inning, but he surrounded it with three strikeouts
in a dominant showing. The sixth represented some actual trouble for the Red Sox
starter, and in what became a trend all afternoon it came on singles. He did
record a couple of outs in the inning, but ended up leaving the bases loaded for
his bullpen on three singles of different varieties. One came on a rocket off
the Monster, one was an infield single and one was a soft line drive that fell
into right field.
Heath Hembree would
come in with the bases jams, and he quickly induced a pop up to right field to
end the inning. That closed the book on Rodriguez, who tossed 5 2⁄3 innings
of scoreless ball on nine hits (all singles) with no walks and seven strikeouts.
From here it was just on the bullpen to make sure the Red Sox didn’t have to
turn to their closer. Hembree came
back out for the seventh and allowed one single but nothing beyond that. The
eighth belonged to Bobby
Poyner, and he allowed a pair of singles before
escaping with the shutout still in hand. Brian Johnson came in for the ninth and
he gave the O’s their first extra-base hit of the day in the form of a leadoff
double. He’d work his way around that, though and maintain the shutout and give
the Red Sox their fourth win in five days.
Martinez and Mookie Betts became the first pair of players in Red Sox
history with 15 or more homers in the first 50 games of a season. Manager Alex Cora gave DH-1B Hanley
Ramirez, in a 5-for-26 slump with no extra-base hits in
his last six games, the day off. He did the same for shortstop Xander
Bogaerts.
Dustin Pedroia
was slated to be the DH in a rehab game at Triple-A Pawtucket. The Red Sox
improved to 14-1 in series finales.
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