Red Sox - 200 040 200 - 8 11 0 Royals - 000 000 000 - 0 3 1Chris Sale struck out 12 batters in a complete game, three-hit shutout on Wednesday night. It was Sale's (9-3-0-0-12, 102) first complete game win in a Red Sox uniform. He also threw a complete game for Boston on June 15, 2017, but it was only eight innings in a 1-0 to the Phillies. Sale has struck out 10+ batters in six of his last seven starts, and seven of his last nine.
Rafael Devers continues his destruction of American League pitchers. He doubled and homered, scored three runs, drove in three runs, stole a base, and made several fine plays at third base. And he won't turn 23 until the first off-day in this fall's World Series. Jackie Bradley walked twice and smacked a three-run double in the fifth. The Red Sox scored eight runs on 11 hits, but the big three of Mookie Betts, J.D. Martinez, and Xander Bogaerts went 0-for-13 (though Mookie and X both walked and scored).
In Toronto, the Blue Jays wasted an early 3-0 lead and trailed the Yankees 7-4 during the seventh-inning stretch. They hit three home runs and scored seven runs in two innings against the MFY's supposed unscoreuponable bullpen. Vladimir Guerrero Jr's three-run dong to deep left off Zack Britton turned New York's 7-6 lead into a 9-7 Toronto edge. The Rays moved to 1.5 GB and Boston is 6.5 GB.
Sale - in the 300th game of his career - faced 29 batters (two over the minimum) and went to a three-ball count only three times. In fact, he threw as many as two balls to only eight batters. He has thrown more pitches in six of his previous 12 starts this season than the 102 he threw tonight. Sale struck out the side in the eighth inning on nine pitches - an "immaculate inning". Sale's obliteration of those three batters was total. I rewatched it with a stopwatch and the half-inning lasted 2 minutes, 40 seconds.
0:00 - Chris Sale looked in for the catcher's sign.Sale threw an immaculate inning less than a month ago, on May 8 against the Orioles. The only other pitcher known to have done it twice in the same season was Lefty Grove in 1928, against Cleveland on August 23 and against the White Sox on September 27.
0:03 - Kelvin Gutierrez (batting right) took a 85 mph changeup for called strike one.
0:11 - Kelvin Gutierrez swung and missed a 94 mph fastball for strike two.
0:27 - Kelvin Gutierrez took a 82 mph slider for called strike three.
0:54 - Nicky Lopez (batting left) took a 78 mph slider for called strike one.
1:06 - Nicky Lopez fouled off a 96 mph fastball for strike two.
1:26 - Nicky Lopez took a 84 mph slider for strike three.
2:01 - Martin Maldonado (batting right) took a 80 mph slider for called strike one.
2:17 - Martin Maldonado took a 81 mph slider for called strike two.
2:31 - Martin Maldonado swung and missed a 98 mph fastball for strike three.
2:39 - Chris Sale walked off the mound with a completely blank expression.
However - and it is a huge "however" - we have reliable pitch-by-pitch data only as far back as 1988, so any number of pitchers could have done it twice (or three times )or more)) in the same season. We will never know. The only reason we know certain pitchers did it 100+ years ago is because newspaper accounts made a point of mentioning it or there exists an old scorecard.
Sale had received only 3.03 runs of support in his first 12 starts. The Red Sox started to remedy that before Sale took the mound. Mookie Betts walked and went to second when Jakob Junis's first pitch to Andrew Benintendi went wildly to the backstop. Benny singled to right, with Betts stopping at third. J.D. Martinez popped to short left-center. Devers forced JDM at second and beat the relay to first, as Mookie scored. Devers stole second. Xander Bogaerts was safe on the first baseman's error (after umpire Dan Iassonga's initial call of 'out' was quickly overturned). Brock Holt's single to right scored Devers. (Iassonga had another incorrect call against the Red Sox overturned, when Sale picked off Whit Merrifield at first to end the third. Heck of a job, Brownie!)
Benintendi doubled to start the fourth. After Martinez flied to right, Devers doubled to right, making it 3-0. Bogaerts walked and Holt reached on an infield single. the bases were loaded. Michael Chavis struck out but Jackie Bradley doubled to deep left, clearing the bases.
Devers hit the first pitch of the seventh out of the park to right-center, but you might not know about that because NESN WAS BUSY SHOWING A COMMERCIAL. (Of course.) Boston went on to load the bases and scored its final run on Sandy León's sac fly.
Betts, RFXander Bogaerts is hitting .342/.406/.632 (1.038 OPS) over his last 27 games (since May 3), with 30 runs scored, 24 RBI, and 17 extra-base hits.
Benintendi, LF
Martinez, DH
Devers, 3B
Bogaerts, SS
Holt, 2B
Chavis, 1B
Bradley, CF
León, C
Xander Bogaerts's Rankings Among MLB Shortstops (2015-19)
(Minimum 300 games at SS)
AVG - .295 – 1st - tied with Segura and Seager, .005 higher than Lindor RBI - 375 – 1st - 27 more than Correa, 42 more than Lindor Runs - 413 – 1st - 10 more than Lindor, 45 more than Segura Doubles - 164 – 1st - 19 more than Lindor, 25 more than Andrus Hits - 760 – 1st - 19 more than Segura, 46 more than Lindor BB - 231 - 3rd - 10 fewer than Correa, 1 fewer than Lindor OBP - .356 - 2nd - tied with Correa, .012 lower than Seager SLG - .454 - 5th OPS - .811 - 5th NOTE: PAs - 2844 - 1st - 71 more than Lindor, 74 more than Galvis, 144 more than SeguraLinescores of the (Yester)Day
AL East: MFY/Blue Jays, 7 PM.BAL - 410 400 201 - 12 15 4 TEX - 101 100 116 - 11 14 0 TBR - 002 000 040 - 6 9 2 DET - 100 050 30x - 9 12 0
I thought Maldonado swung at that high heat for strike three (so not a gift). Replay here: https://es.pn/2IoLuhn
ReplyDeleteYou're right. I even have a properly-facing K on my scorecard, though I'm fairly positive Gameday had a called strike listed, though it does not now. I'm glad to be corrected on this.
ReplyDelete