April 25, 2022

Red Sox, In A Batting Slump (2.3 Runs/Game Over The Last Week), Face Blue Jays

On Sunday, the Red Sox knocked out four hits in their first five plate appearances against the Rays. For the rest of the game, they reverted to form, going 2-for-28 (with one walk), and lost 5-2.

The Red Sox (7-9) have lost four of their last five games and will now face Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (.351/.409/.649) and his tied-for-first-place Blue Jays for four games.

Starting Pitchers:

Tonight: Nate Eovaldi / José Berríos, 7 PM ET
Tuesday: Nick Pivetta / Kevin Gausman, 7 PM ET
Wednesday: Michael Wacha / Ross Stripling, 7 PM ET
Thursday: Garrett Whitlock / Alek Manoah, 3 PM ET

The Red Sox will be without pitchers Tanner Houck and Kutter Crawford for the Toronto series. Both  unvaccinated players have been placed on the restricted list and will not be paid or accrue service time. Tyler Danish has been called up to replace Crawford.

Over their last seven games, the Red Sox have scored only 16 runs (2.3 per game), including three runs or fewer in all but one of those contests. Runs by game since April 17: 3, 2, 1, 2, 4, 2, 2. Over that span, the team is hitting .217/.262/.302. The pitching has been decent (3.59 ERA), averaging 4.1 runs per game. (Overall this season, Boston is averaging 3.6 runs per game.)

The Red Sox need to start hitting (and scoring runs), but it also wouldn't hurt if they didn't have to contend with asshat umpires. On Sunday, Boston led 2-0 in the bottom of the fifth, but the Rays had the bases loaded (thanks to two walks and a HBP) with one out. Ryan Brasier came in from the pen and, on an 0-2 count to Ji-Man Choi, threw Pitch #4.

Plate umpire Ryan Wills clearly blew what should have been a strike three call, giving the Red Sox a second out. Vazquez stood up to catch the pitch, but a competent umpire should be able to deal with that distraction. Instead, Choi continued to bat and hit the next pitch for a game-tying double. A groundout gave the Rays a 3-2 lead. And they won 5-2.

2 comments:

allan said...

Joe Posnanski, JoeBlogs, today:

"You're probably aware that offense is not just down right now, but SCARY down. Let's talk about that for a minute, because even though it's early, and the weather will turn and all that, at this particular moment in time, teams are averaging BARELY over four runs per game. I mean barely — if the Cubs had not scored 21 on the Pirates the other day, teams would be averaging fewer than 4 runs per game; it's that close right now.

The last time teams averaged fewer than four runs per game? That would be 1976.

Teams are hitting .232 right now. The last time the league batting average was that low? Never.

In the same spirit, teams are averaging 7.63 hits per game. The last time teams were averaging that few hits? Never.

Fewest hits per game:
2022: 7.63
1908: 7.75
1968: 7.91
1909: 7.92
1907: 7.99

That's not the best company, no. And yet, this is the way the game has been going. Next on the list is the COVID season (8.04 hits per game) and then comes 2021 (8.13 hits per game). The lack of hits in baseball is kind of an epidemic."
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Paul Hickman said...

To me this is statistically fascinating - because of .... WHY ????

Where are we re the Pitching Mound being pushed back 6 inches or a foot ?

Surely this is gonna pile on the pressure to make it possibly 2 feet !!!!!!!

I can think of quite a few theories as to why ...... and it is probably a combination of 3-4 factors ?