BSJ Game Report, ALDS Gm. 1: Rays 5, Red Sox 0 - Boston can't push through vs. Tampa pitching

All you need to know, in quickie form, about the Red Sox' loss to the Rays, complete with BSJ analysis and insight:

BOX SCORE

HEADLINES

Red Sox start slow, and don't recover: If you were hoping for a little momentum swing off of Tuesday night's win over the Yankees, that didn't happen. In fact, the Red Sox got off to a terrible start and couldn't dig out of the early 3-0 hole against the Rays' pitching staff.

In the top of the first inning, all three Sox struck out against rookie LHP Shane McClanahan. In the bottom half, Eduardo Rodriguez walked the lead-off hitter, and then Wander Franco plated him with an RBI double that was bobbled by Enrique Hernandez. Rafael Devers also appeared to double-clutch on a soft infield single that plated Franco for a 2-0 lead.

Rodriguez was done after 1.2 innings. The Rays added a solo shot from Nelson Cruz in the third off Nick Pivetta and it was tough sledding from there.

Red Sox have quiet 9-hit outing: Boston, believe it or not, out-hit the Rays 9-6 — and that was the quietest nine hits you've ever seen. Not one extra-base hit. They could not string anything together.

"Yeah, we had traffic out there, and we just didn't cash in," said Alex Cora. "Bobby (Dalbec) hit a few missiles with men on. Obviously, in the eighth we load the bases; we didn't score. There were some good at-bats in the middle of the game, grind at-bats. Others were kind of like empty, but I think overall we did a good job hitting line drives and staying in the middle of the field."

1st inning: K, K, Single, then strikeout to end inning.
2nd: Single, error to lead off; Bobby Dalbec double play, line out.
4th: Out, single, out, single, line out.
5th: Out, single, out, out.
6th: Single, line out, Hunter Renfroe double play.
8th: Single, out, single, single, Devers strikeout, Renfroe foul out.

That was it.

The game lacked so much action from a Red Sox perspective that their Twitter account didn't tweet once during the game:

Arozarena steals home in 7th: To add insult to injury — and, actually, flat-out embarrassment — Randy Arozarena stole home off Josh Taylor to make it 5-0. Taylor, a lefty, didn't play close attention and with Rafael Devers playing well off the bag in a shift, the Rays rookie easily stole home. He became the first player to homer (5th inning) and steal home in the same postseason game in MLB history.

"I noticed that the pitcher wasn't really watching for me or covering for me, and I saw the third baseman was pretty far away in respect to where I was at," Arozarena said. "I was looking over to (the third base coach), telling him, 'Hey, I'm going to go, I'm going to go.' Peeked over and saw (Kevin) Cash give him the green light as well, so that's when I decided to take off."

Said Cora: "It's a great baseball play. He had a great baseball game today. You know, I think J.T. was actually paying attention, but probably two strikes, you know, he had (Brandon) Lowe with two strikes and probably the concentration was with the hitter. Just put him away, and Randy had an amazing job, and that was an amazing baseball play."

TURNING POINT 

Despite being down 5-0, the Red Sox had a chance to dent the Rays' lead and put a scare into them when they loaded the bases with one out. But Devers' strikeout and Renfroe's pop foul out were a pretty weak showing.

THREE UP 

Nick Pivetta: His final line doesn't look great (3 runs on four hits and two homers in 4.2 innings), but he kept the Sox close for a while. "He gave us a chance to win the game," said Cora. "It's not only that he was just coming to get the bulk of the innings. We were very aggressive just because of the situation."

Kyle Schwarber/Xander Bogaerts: Both were 2 for 4, but they got no help behind them.

THREE DOWN

Eduardo Rodriguez: Walked the lead-off hitter in each of his two innings and got pulled before the second inning concluded (1.2, 2 hits, 2 R, 2 BB, 1 K). 

"I think the change-up tonight, you know, for Eddie wasn't there. Actually, the fastball didn't look great early," Cora said. "The goal was for Eddie go deeper into the game and maybe use Nick and finish it off, but we felt that if we contained the offense for a while there, we were good enough offensively to put traffic and score some runs. It just happened that we didn't score."

Rafael Devers/Hunter Renfroe: The 4-5 hitters in the lineup combined to go 2 for 8 but also left five runners on base each. If they come through better, this is a different ballgame. Devers' at-bats late in this game were awkward and he appears to be dealing with a right arm injury that contributed to two of the Red Sox' five strikeouts. Cora said Devers' injury is not a big deal.

"After 162, things that happen and you get treatment, and you grind, you know?" he said. "Not everybody is 100% right now, and he is posting. Like I said a few days ago, you know, he was dropping the bat the same way, and nobody said anything."

Kike Hernandez: From the lead-off spot, he was a big goose egg (0 for 4) and his bobble in the first inning, that was not ruled an error, let in an unforced run and got the crowd into the game early.

QUOTE OF NOTE

"We're good. We're good. I love the at-bats today ... we put some pressure on them. They made some plays. We hit some balls hard,  but we got Chris (Sale), and he is ready to go. So the bullpen is rested, so we should be okay." - Cora.

STATISTICALLY SPEAKING 

* The shutout loss was the first for the Red Sox in the postseason since Game 2 of the 2016 ALDS vs. Cleveland.

* The loss was just the second in the last 11 postseason games under Alex Cora.

* Eduardo Rodriguez saw his career ERA in the postseason inflate to 8.49.

* The last time the Red Sox played a postseason game with neither a walk nor an extra-base hit was 1903.

UP NEXT

Game 2: 7:02 p.m. Friday, RHP Shane Baz (2-0, 2.03 ERA in 3 starts) vs. LHP Chris Sale (5-1, 3.16 ERA)

Baz was called up Sept. 20th from Triple-A Durham and had 18 strikeouts in 13.1 IP. He will be making his first career postseason start.

Sale is 1-2, 5.76 ERA in seven postseason appearances.