Another win. It was fun to see the understudies come up big in the ninth to secure the comeback.
More important than the result this afternoon, though, is that Addison Barger was forced to leave in the first inning after taking a Garrett Crochet fastball off the hand. To add insult to injury, it was eventually decided that he hadn’t checked his swing, so instead of going to first for him, Charles McAdoo was forced to enter a PA with two strikes.
Barger’s injury was described as a finger contusion. Hopefully that means that they don’t think any bones are broken. I assume it’ll be at least a few days before we see him again, but if it’s only that we’ll have to count ourselves lucky.
On to the game itself. The starters played five innings for both clubs. In that part of the game:
The offence had an up and down afternoon. On the good side of the ledger, Alan Roden lined a pair of doubles, the second of which drove Orelvis Martinez home for the Jays’ first run, and a walk. Martinez himself had a ground rule double and a walk while striking out once. Steward Berroa drove Roden in for the Jays’ second run with a double of his own. RJ Schreck reached twice, the first on an infield single and the second on a walk.
On the bad side, Leo Jimenez and Christian Bethancourt both struck out twice, as did Berroa. Charles McAdoo sort of did, although the first was in the PA where he took over for Addison Barger with two strikes.
The Blue Jays’ pitchers were mostly bad. Yariel Rodriguez gave up a run on a pair of singles and a double in the first, then walked the bases loaded before Nick Fraze came on to get a fly out that ended the inning. Back in the second, he got a couple of outs but gave up a walk and battled his command, and again needed bullpen help, this time from Andrew Bash. Bash gave up a home run to Alex Bregman, putting Boston out front 3-0.
After Bash worked a clean third with the help of a nice diving catch by Roden, Jake Bloss took over as the other featured pitcher of the afternoon for the Jays. Again, he couldn’t get through the inning, giving up a line single to Ceddanne Rafaela, who stope second and scored on a wild pitch. Nate Eaton worked a walk and scored himself on a Bregman double smoked off the top of the wall for the Sox’ fifth run. Ryan Boyer had to face the final batter of the inning.
Bloss was better in the fifth, getting two pop outs and a towering fly out into the triangle to retire the side in order.
It was 5-2 Red Sox after five innings. Notes from later in the game:
- Braydon Fisher had a great sixth, striking out two Sox hitters and popping up the third.
- Eddinson Paulino lined an opposite field double against his former club (who sent him to Toronto as part of the Danny Jansen deal.
- Ryan Jennings worked two scoreless innings, giving up two singles and hitting a batter while recording two Ks.
- The offence arrived all at once in the ninth. Boston reliever Zach Fogell gave up three singles and two walks while hitting a batter and recording only one out, which brought the Jays within one. Two more singles cleared the bases, putting the Jays ahead 8-6.
- Paxton Schultz surrendered two in the bottom of the ninth but held on for the win.