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THE BEST RED SOX TEAM EVAH! ...
The Sox slam the Yankees
in the final game
September 30, 2018
...
The regular season came to a close and the Sox did just about
everything well. They hadn’t lost four in a row all year heading into
this game, but were in danger of accomplishing that feat with a loss
in the regular season finale.
The offense did put some runs on the board in the first two
games of this series, but a lot of the damage came when the game was already out
of hand, and they missed some opportunities earlier in games. Today they made
sure to reverse that trend, scoring early and often and putting the game out of
hand early, this time in their favor.
To be fair, they were going up against a pitcher in Luis
Cessa who has struggled pretty much all year and is
certainly not going to appear in the postseason for New York. Still, it’s always
good to see offense. Mookie
Betts jumped on Cessa early with a leadoff single in
the bottom of the first, and then he’d come around to score in the next at bat
when Aaron
Judge misplayed a Brock
Holt single. Two batters into the inning and it was a
1-0 lead for Boston. J.D.
Martinez followed it up with a single of his own
before Mitch
Moreland knocked in another run with a double. The
breaks just kept coming for the Red Sox when Eduardo Núñez hit a ground ball to
first but reached on an error, though Boston’s infielder did appear to twist an
ankle on a collision at the bag. He stayed in the game, though. After that, the
Red Sox would score one more on an Ian
Kinsler ground out, and they had a 4-0 lead after one.
In the second, they just continued to pile on. This time it
was Jackie
Bradley Jr. starting things off with a single, and two
batters later Brock
Holt stayed hot with a Fenway Double off the Monster to
knock in Boston’s fifth run of the game. Then, a couple of batters after that, Xander
Bogaerts got a 97 mph up and in and he crushed it to
straightaway center field for a two-run shot. Just like that, it was a 7-0 lead
for the Red Sox after just two innings.
They’d take an inning off in the third, but then they got
right back into action in the fourth. This time it was against Jordan Sheffield,
and the young Yankees southpaw
was wild. He hit Tzu-Wei Lin, who came in for Betts after Alex
Cora gave the likely MVP a chance for an ovation from
the Fenway crowd, then walked Holt on
four pitches. He then made the mistake of throwing strikes to Martinez,
who fittingly ended his season with a home run. The slugger smashed one into the
Red Sox bullpen, and that put the team’s run total for the afternoon in double
digits.
Meanwhile, on the pitching side was where Boston was really
looking for a recovery after the first two games of this series.
Rick Porcello got
the start, and he was slated to throw just two innings in the game. He got
through them with ease, allowing just a walk while racking up a pair of
strikeouts and inducing four ground outs.
After that, it was a hodgepodge of relievers. Joe
Kelly was up first, and he didn’t look great. The
righty started his inning off with two baserunners on a single and a walk, but
then managed to get out of the trouble with a big strikeout and then a double
play from Judge. The one really bad performance came from Bobby
Poyner, who entered for the fourth and allowed three
baserunners including a two-run homer to straightaway center from Luke Voit. At
the time it cut Boston’s lead to five, though they’d obviously get some runs
back.
Perhaps the most important pitching performances came in
the fifth sixth when Eduardo
Rodriguez and Matt
Barnes came into the game. First it was Rodriguez,
who was specifically called out by Cora for his poor performance on Saturday. He
responded to the criticism well, tossing an easy 1-2-3 inning that included a
pair of K’s. Then, Matt
Barnes came in after struggling in his last outing, and
he allowed just a single while looking strong.
The seventh belonged to Ryan
Brasier, and he’d get through it allowing just a walk.
In the eighth, it was Drew
Pomeranz and he contributed a 1-2-3 inning. Finally, it
was Craig Kimbrel to finish off the game and the regular season. Poetically, it
ended perfectly with as the closer struck out the side for 108 wins. |
