THE BEST RED SOX TEAM EVAH! ... Steve Pearce pumps a HR vs the Rangers
#63
July 9, 2018
... The Red
Sox are on a
roll, and that continued back at Fenway in the series opener against
the Rangers.
This time, the offense took a bit of a break until late but the
pitching was able to pick them up in a big way. Eduardo
Rodriguez put
up results and got through 5 2⁄3 shutout innings. The bullpen picked up
where he left off and the defense was chipping in all night as well.
The Red Sox southpaw did
not allow much hard contact and was putting zeros up against the Rangers all
game long, but he was also throwing a lot of pitches. He nibbled around the edge
of the zone, didn’t throw a lot of changeups and ended up going deep into almost
every count.
The Rangers didn’t even
really threaten against the lefty in the first two innings as each frame
included one baserunner on a walk but no player advancing beyond first base.
However, thanks to the free passes and three strikeouts in the two innings, he
was already over 40 pitches at this point in the game. Fortunately, he’d settle
down a bit and have a relatively easy 1-2-3 third.
The fourth would represent some real trouble for Rodriguez, however. That inning
led off with a Nomar
Mazara single, and
after a strikeout Adrian
Beltre had a single of
his own to put two on with one out. Rodriguez came back strong from there,
getting a strikeout and a routine fly out to end the inning and keep his shutout
going. He’d do the same in the fifth, though defense was the story there. Rafael
Devers made a poor
error to start that inning, but came back on the next play and made a nice
effort to get one out at second base on a ground ball. From there, Xander
Bogaerts snagged a line
drive on a leaping attempt and Mookie
Betts ran ten miles to
track down a deep fly ball and end the inning unscathed.
Meanwhile, the Red Sox
offense had some trouble getting consistent rallies going against Mike
Minor, reverting to
those struggles against left-handed pitching yet again. They were able to get a
couple of early runs, however, and those fortunately held up. The first inning
saw a couple of quick outs, but J.D.
Martinez kept things
alive with a base hit. That brought Steve
Pearce up to the plate,
and he had quite the start to his Fenway career. Minor threw
him a fastball middle-in, and the lefty mashed it. Pearce
sent one into the Monster Seats and just like that the Red Sox had an early 2-0
lead.
Things slowed down after
this. The second was a quick 1-2-3 inning, and in the third they were able to
get two into scoring position on a Sandy León single and an Andrew
Benintendi double, but
the middle of the lineup couldn’t cash in. After that, it was two more
uneventful scoreless innings, and the 2-0 lead was what stood heading into the
sixth.
There, Rodriguez took the
mound to start the top half with 95 pitches under his belt, and it looked like
he could make it out. The lefty got a couple of very quick outs, but then he
allowed a single and a walk and that was the end of his night. He did hand off a
tough situation for Heath
Hembree though, with
two on and two out. The reliever came through, though, getting a huge strikeout
to end the threat and preserve the shutout.
After the Red Sox went down in a scoreless sixth, Brandon
Workman was
called upon for the seventh. Things did not get off to a great start as he
allowed a leadoff triple to Robinson
Chirinos off
the wall in straightaway center field. Workman came
back strong from there, though, getting a strikeout and two ground outs to keep
the runner 90 feet from home and preserving the 2-0 lead.
The Sox offense would
once again go down quietly in the bottom of the seventh, leading to Joe
Kelly taking
the mound for the eighth. He would, like Workman, allow the leadoff man to reach
before getting three straight outs (including two strikeouts) to keep the
shutout in hand.
In the bottom of the eighth the Red Sox were finally able to cushion their lead
a bit when J.D. Martinez came up with two on and nobody out. He got a fastball
in and he smoked it out to left field for a three-run shot, extending the lead
to five and allowing Craig
Kimbrel to
sit in the bullpen. Instead it was Ryan
Brasier in
the ninth for his Red Sox debut and he tossed an impressive 1-2-3 inning to
close out the game.
GAME RECAP
F E N
W A Y
P A R
K
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
R
H
E
TEXAS RANGERS
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
5
0
BOSTON RED SOX
2
0
0
0
0
0
0
3
x
5
9
1
W-Eduardo Rodriguez (11-3)
L-Mike Minor (6-5)
Attendance - 36,754
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