All you need to know, in quickie form, about the Red Sox' 10-8 win over the Blue Jays, complete with BSJ analysis and insight:
BOX SCORE
HEADLINES
Sox keep beating up the bad teams: The Red Sox' struggles against quality teams are no secret and their issues were on full display over the weekend when they dropped two straight to the Dodgers. That left the Sox with a 19-28 record against teams with winning records. But when the Sox face lesser opponents, they go for the kill. With the win Monday night, the Sox improved to 8-5 against the Blue Jays and have three wins against them in the last two weeks. Of the 19 wins the Red Sox have within their own division, 15 have come against either the Orioles or Blue Jays. The good news? The Sox have three more with Toronto to finish up this homestand, then go to Baltimore for three against the O's over the weekend. That's six games and six opportunities to beat up on the bottom-feeders in the division. But after that, the going gets much tougher for the Sox with a steady diet of games against only the Rays and Yankees.
Porcello shows slight improvement: For the first few innings, it looked like another rough night for Rick Porcello, who had been shelled for 17 runs in his three previous starts. The Blue Jays cuffed him around for two in the second and another two in the third. But from there on, Porcello was much sharper, allowing just two hits over three scoreless innings the rest of the way. Pitching coach Dana LeVangie suggested some changes and Porcello implemented them. "I think some things went a lot better in the last three innings of the game,'' said Porcello. "Those are definitely some things I can build off of; I made some adjustments and things were much, much better.'' Porcello said he made a few mechanical changes after detecting that he was flying open with his delivery and getting "too rotational with my pitches.''
Brasier makes it closer than it should have been: The Sox seemed to be cruising in the later innings, with a comfortable 10-4 lead after seven. But a poor eighth inning by Ryan Brasier led to four runs by the Blue Jays and necessitated an appearance by Matt Barnes to get the final out of the inning. "Not quality pitches or putting guys away,'' noted Alex Cora, who pointed out that a number of the big hits off Brasier came with two strikes. Cora was not happy that he needed to use Barnes to close out the eighth, or that he had to turn to Brandon Workman for a save situation in the ninth. "We can't make mistakes in those situations,'' he said. "I know they're trying to do their best, I know they're trying to execute. But if we're going to pull this off, we have to better. We won but we made some mistakes. We've got to keep improving.''
TURNING POINT
The Red Sox had jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the bottom of the first, but the Jays chipped away with two in the second and two more in the third, getting back in the game. However, the Sox hit the gas again in the bottom of the third, sending 10 men to the plate and scoring another five runs to effectively put the game out of reach.
https://twitter.com/RedSox/status/1150933676068417539
TWO UP
Michael Chavis: The first baseman had the biggest hit of the first inning when he smashed a pitch over everything in left-center for his first career grand slam.
https://twitter.com/RedSox/status/1150913441068179457
Andrew Benintendi: After being limited to just one hit in 13 at-bats against the Dodgers over the weekend, Benintendi broke out and produced two hits and knocked in three runs.
TWO DOWN
Rafael Devers: Devers did have a two-run single, but had an up-and-down night in the field, making a couple of nice plays, but also being charged with two errors, his first multi-error game of the season.
Sandy Leon: The Red Sox catcher had five plate appearances, but finished 0-for-4 with a walk.
QUOTE OF NOTE:
"I can't say enough about our offense -- they're unbelievable.'' — Porcello.
STATISTICALLY SPEAKING
- The Red Sox have scored runs in the first inning in 11 of their last 14 games.
- The Sox have 27 homers in their last 15 games.
- Chavis took over the A.L. Rookie lead in RBI with 52.
- Mookie Betts has scored runs in each of the last 10 games.
- Devers has 21 RBI in 12 games against Toronto this season.