Overall, it’s difficult to be dissatisfied with the Red Sox’s handling of their recent ordeal. Six of the Red Sox’s eight series since the All-Star break have been against postseason clubs, and they will return home Thursday 10 games over.500 with a 13-11 record over that time.
The Red Sox have demonstrated that they can compete with the best, but this most recent road trip also demonstrated that they are far from invincible.
The Red Sox finished the road trip with a 2-4 record after losing to the Houston Astros 4-1 in Wednesday’s series finale. This was their second consecutive series loss. The top three batters in Boston’s lineup went 0 for 11 on the day, and Hunter Brown solidified his Cy Young Award chances with another gem, shutting down the Red Sox over 6.2 brilliant innings.
The Astros quickly took the lead on Wednesday after the Red Sox ran out to two early leads in the first two games. Yainer Diaz expanded the advantage with an RBI single to make it 2-0 after the Astros worked two walks after Jeremy Pea hit a leadoff home run off Walker Buehler to start the bottom of the first.
Ceddanne Rafaela’s RBI single against Brown gave the Red Sox a run back in the second inning, but they struggled to score any more runs against the Astros star.
For the remainder of the game, Brown prevented another Red Sox run. He fought his way out of another two-on, two-out jam for a scoreless fourth inning after striking out Connor Wong with men on second and third to escape the second inning.
Jarren Duran walked, advanced to second on a balk, and then to third on a groundout in the sixth, giving Boston its best opportunity to score a run late in the game against Brown. The Red Sox were certain that Brown would have driven in the tying run if he had balked again during Romy Gonzalez’s subsequent at-bat, but the umpires decided there was no infraction and Brown forced a groundout to strand Duran at third.
He came out again during a pitching change in the seventh inning, which infuriated Red Sox manager Alex Cora, who then dismissed him from the game.
After the game, Cora clarified that the umpires had made the correct call. However, he had a problem since, in similar circumstances before, the umpires had asked the pitcher to indicate whether they would pitch from the windup or the stretch, but this time, they didn’t.
We’ve witnessed instances over the past two years where the pitcher is asked to declare during a routine windup, and that’s all that’s happened,” Cora said. After that, I walked out to educate myself. To be honest, I told him that I wanted to learn and find out. I don’t know if he thought I was being sarcastic, but I wasn’t, and as I was leaving, he kicked me out.
As good as Brown was, Buehler contributed to keeping the game within one run, at least for a while.
Following Diaz’s RBI single, Buehler calmed down after getting into early difficulty in the first and retired 15 of the next 16 batters he faced. He just required four pitches to record a spotless fifth inning, but he walked Victor Caratini in the sixth inning after recording two fast outs.
Diaz reached the plate as a result, and the Astros catcher destroyed a hanging sweeper 415 feet for a two-run home run, defeating Buehler once more.
Over the course of six innings, Buehler gave up four hits, four walks, and three strikeouts while giving up four runs.
According to Cora, he threw the ball well. He was in a difficult place at the end because of the walk and the homer, but he gave us a chance to win by using all of his pitches and moving the ball around. Pea gets the pitch in the zone and knocks it out of the ballpark.
Buehler has been more productive since the beginning of July, despite a few shorter excursions and the fact that walks have continued to be a problem. His season ERA dropped from a peak of 6.45 to 5.43 as he recorded a 3.69 ERA across 39 innings over his last seven starts.
In the seventh, Brown capped off a good outing by preventing a possible Red Sox rally with a huge double play before left-hander Bennett Sousa struck out Roman Anthony to close the inning. The Red Sox only went 1 for 7 with runners in scoring position against the Cy Young Award contender, even though Brown finished with one run allowed over 6.2 innings and six hits and three walks.
With All-Star closer Josh Hader sidelined due to shoulder issues, the Red Sox made a final push against Bryan Abreu, his replacement, in the top of the ninth inning despite their lackluster performance against the Astros bullpen. Gonzalez and Masataka Yoshida singled first and second in the eighth, but Abreu ended the game with two strikeouts and a pop-out.
Before playing the Miami Marlins in a three-game series at Fenway Park this weekend, Boston will have Thursday off. Even though the Red Sox have already dropped five of their past seven games, they will still play losing clubs in four of their next five series.
Cora remarked, “We go to Boston and we do our thing at home.” Although we didn’t win the series, I believe we performed well against two strong teams. We are in the business of winning, not losing series.
Friday’s game versus the Marlins is set to start at 7:10 p.m.
One of the players acquired in the June Rafael Devers trade, left-hander Kyle Harrison, has started to gain traction in Triple-A and had his finest start to date on Wednesday. In the final 1-0 loss against the WooSox, the 24-year-old pitched five scoreless innings and recorded eight strikeouts. Since July 13, he has now recorded a 1.59 ERA across 28.1 innings in his last six starts.
Harrison made 39 MLB appearances with San Francisco before being acquired, but he hasn’t yet pitched in the major leagues with Boston. He is still a depth option for the team this year and has the potential to be a regular of the rotation for many years to come.
According to the WooSox transaction log, right-hander Nick Burdi, who was assigned by the Red Sox earlier this week, has been outrighted back to Triple-A Worcester after clearing waivers. Burdi has made 20 appearances with the WooSox this season, pitching 5.1 scoreless innings in his four appearances. His ERA is 1.88.
