Walk-off mania struck again for the Red Sox.
Mitch Moreland swatted an opposite field homer into the Monster Seats in the bottom of the 11th inning, giving the Red Sox a 3-2 victory over the Chicago White Sox for their fourth consecutive win and fifth in six games. It was the eighth walkoff win of the season for the Sox and second this week.
In the top of the ninth, closer Craig Kimbrel bailed himself out of a first-and-second, no-out jam, finishing the inning with two strikeouts to leave to baserunners in scoring position.
Boston couldn't do much with Chicago starter Carlos Rodon, who fanned 11 without issuing a walk in 7.2 innings. A sharp single by Chris Young pushed the first Red Sox run of the night across in the fifth. In the sixth, a solo homer from Eduardo Nunez tied things. It was Nunez's third homer in 32 at-bats since joining the Sox after hitting just four homers in 320 at-bats with the Giants.
The White Sox had taken a 2-0 lead off Eduardo Rodrigues in the fourth when Nicky Delmonico doubled high off the wall, scoring both Jose Abreu and Leury Garcia.
GAME NO.: 110
WHO: Red Sox (60-49) vs Chicago White Sox (41-65)
WHEN: 7:10 p.m.
WHERE: Fenway Park
TV: NESN
RADIO: WEEI (93.7 FM)
PITCHERS: Eduardo Rodriguez (4-3, 4.16) vs. Carlos Rodon (1-4, 5.23)
BOX SCORE: MLB Gameday
SERIES TO DATE: The Red Sox took two-of-three from the White Sox in Chicago in May and won the opener of this four-game set Thursday night, 9-5.
WHERE THINGS STAND: Boston was a half-game out of first as recently as last weekend, but a three-game winning streak, coupled with three straight losses for the Yankees, has the Sox with a two-game lead over their rivals in the A.L. East. The White Sox have lost three in a row and eight of their last 10 and sit in the basement of the A.L. Central.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR: In the last week, the Red Sox have seen their offense get re-ignited, averaging 7.8 runs per game over the five games. Rodon has pitched well against the Red Sox in the past, but he doesn’t have much of a bullpen behind him, especially after Chicago needed 6.1 innings from its relievers on Thursday night.
STAT OF NOTE: The Sox are 33-20 at Fenway, giving them the league’s best home winning percentage (.623) in the American League
LINEUPS:
RED SOX
Betts RF
Benintendi LF
Nunez 2B
Ramirez 1B
Devers 3B
Bogaerts SS
Young DH
Vazquez C
Bradley Jr. CF
WHITE SOX:
Anderson SS
Saladino DH
Abreu 1B
Smith C
Garcia RF
Moncada 2B
Delmonico LF
Engel CF
Sanchez 3B
PRE-GAME NOTES:
- LHP David Price, who threw on flat ground earlier this week, is experiencing what his manager labeled "general soreness'' in the left elbow area and won't throw again until that subsides. "He needs some additional time and treatment to address (the issue),'' said John Farrell. "It's more of a kind of a day-to-day situation, based on how he feels. When he's feeling as he does after throwing for a couple of days, we're backing off him right now.''
- Dustin Pedroia began some "light baseball activity'' Friday and is expected to begin taking some swings Saturday. "He's making some steady progress,''' Farrell said.
- RHP Joe Kelly is set to be activated Saturday. "He'll be in some low-leverage situations (initially),'' Farrell said. "I can't say how many that will be. It's going to depend on score, who's available -- those kinds of things.''
- Once again, pitch count is an issue with Eduardo Rodriguez. Admittedly, tonight is an improvement over last time when he needed a staggering 107 pitches to get through just four innings. Tonight, he's at 95 after five, which is a little better. It seems the reason for his inefficiency changes from start-to-start. Sometimes, he nibbles and runs counts full to every hitter without being confident enough to challenge hitters. Sometimes, he appears unable to put hitters away - even when he gets ahead -- and ends up seeing his count rise with a lot of foul balls and hitters wasting pitches. It's not as much of a concern tonight with some off-days coming up and an extra arm in the bullpen, but it's far from ideal.
- The Rafael Devers Show continues. His leadoff single in the fifth extended his hitting streak to eight straight games and he's now reached safely in all nine of his games in the big leagues. It was telling that he hung in on a slider against a tough lefty (Carlos Rodon) to drill his single. As John Farrell noted, Devers has shown the ability to hit virtually anything and everything -- hard, soft, up in the zone, down, lefty, righty...
- Just as players can go into slumps at the plate, they can do so in the field. It looks like that's where Xander Bogaerts is of late. After making just seven errors in his first 81 games this season -- all of them before the All-Star break -- Bogaerts has committed six errors in his last 16 games, including one in the second inning tonight when a hot-shot grounder by Kevan Smith glanced off his glove and went into center field.