The Red Sox successfully minimized the damage done by Shohei Ohtani at the plate Tuesday night. He pulled a ground-rule double down the line in the first, tying the game at 1-1. That marked his second hit of the series to date, the first being a rather harmless single in the series opener.
Limiting him to a single and double in two games in nine plate appearances over the first two games, and considering that Ohtani entered the series with a .704 slugging percentage, that much be considered a victory of sorts. Just keeping Ohtani in the ballpark these days is accomplishment enough.
Unfortunately for the Red Sox Tuesday night, they weren't very successful against Ohtani on the mound. He yielded just two runs on five hits and regularly made tough pitches when needed. While Ohtani was in the game -- he went seven innings -- the Sox were a ghastly 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position.
All of that, plus a rocky first inning for Nathan Eovaldi and some bad fortune later on -- Juan Lagares robbed Xander Bogaerts of a two-run homer with a masterful catch n the top of the sixth, and in the bottom of the inning, the Angels tacked on two runs despite a series of at-bats where the exit velocity of balls in play barely reached the speed limit -- contributed to a 5-3 defeat for the Red Sox.
In its own way, the loss was something of an outlier for the Sox, who had won 10-of-11 coming in. Consider that the last two losses for the Sox had both been of the walk-off variety. In the first, the Tampa Bay Rays secured a 1-0 win with an unearned run scoring in the bottom of the ninth on a swinging strike, wild pitch. It doesn't get any weirder than that.
Their most recent loss, meanwhile, had come Saturday night, in which the Sox went ahead with two runs in the top of the 12th, only to have the A's counter with three runs of their own in the bottom of the inning.
All of which is a roundabout way of saying that, before last night, it had been two weeks since the Red Sox lost a game A) by more than a single run and B) in something other than a walk-off.
Any way you slice it, that's a pretty good stretch of baseball. Included in that run was a three-game sweep of the Yankees at home, a four-game sweep of the Royals at home and a winning series in Oakland this past weekend, followed by a series-opening win Monday night in Anaheim.
In a worst-case scenario for the Red Sox, a loss Wednesday sends them home 3-3 on their longest West Coast road trip of the season, now done and out of the way. A win in the Wednesday matinee, meanwhile, would send them home with a 4-2 mark, two more road series wins and, likely, a bigger lead in the division than when they left Boston last Thursday night.
Even the nagging injuries that have suddenly struck the team aren't of much concern. One night after the Sox lost utility man Marwin Gonzalez to a slight hamstring strain, utility man Danny Santana felt some pull in his left quad as he attempted to beat out a ground ball in the top of the seventh.
The Sox are not carrying any taxi squad players with them on the West Coast, and with an afternoon start in Anaheim Wednesday, the Sox don't have time to get reinforcements in time to southern California. That's potentially an issue since the team has just three extra position players on its current 26-man roster, meaning if both Gonzalez and Santana are unavailable for the road trip finale, they would have rookie catcher Connor Wong as the only extra player on the bench.
However, after the loss Tuesday, Alex Cora noted that Kevin Plawecki (hamstring), who is already eligible to come off the IL and has been traveling and working out with the team, could be activated for Wednesday to provide the Sox with at least one more healthy body.
And while having three catchers among the 13 is rather redundant, Cora quickly noted that both Christian Vazquez and Wong are capable of moving around the infield, providing some flexibility. Problem solved, at least for the day.
That's how it going for the first-place Red Sox, who can't be derailed by the temporary disappointment that comes from being quieted by the game's most compelling figure, nor the potential loss of two players in the span of 24 hours.
A day off awaits Thursday, followed by a visit from the underachieving Phillies for the final series of the first half.
When a two-run loss is the most lopsided defeat you've suffered in two weeks, life is good.