Donnelly: Days after being benched, Alex Verdugo helps set the tone for Red Sox

Less than a week ago, Alex Verdugo was in Alex Cora's doghouse. 

Cora pulled his right fielder from last Wednesday's loss to the Guardians after he failed to hustle on a force out. He remained bench the following night in a blowout loss. 

The message has been received loud and clear by Verdugo, who although was understandably unhappy with the decision, understood it in the end. 

Since being stapled to the pine in the dugout, the 27-year-old is riding a six-game hitting streak, batting .346 (9-for-26).

It all came to a head as the Sox burned the midnight oil in Wednesday's 6-3 win over the Rockies to return to the win column after the start of the game was delayed 2:02 due to biblical rain and lightning around Fenway Park. 

"Very very big," Verdugo said of the win. "I mean obviously, we're on the verge of losing a series by getting swept, you know, so to just take one of them is you know big and obviously give us a little bit of momentum going in this next series."

Verdugo led both in the field and at the plate for Boston as the No. 3 hitter with Rafael Devers and Masataka Yoshida given the night off, going 3-for-4 with a pair of doubles and runs-batted-in. 

"He's in a good place," said Cora. "That's the thing about the leading-off thing. It's a grind sometimes. You've got to take pitches and work the count for your teammates. Then with nights like tonight, and you can just go out there and hit. He stayed with the lefty. He stayed inside the baseball and put good swings."

Verdugo started the game when he came up heaving in right field, gunning down Ezequiel Tovar at the plate as he tried to score on a Ryan McMahon single. Tovar wasn't close with the throw reaching Connor Wong in plenty of time. Verdugo continued to set the tone in the bottom of the first with an RBI single to score Rob Refsnyder (2-for-3, 3B, 2 RBI, BB) for an early lead.

After the Boston bats went silent in the middle innings, Verdugo effectively played the role of offensive closer when his RBI double in the bottom of the seventh extended the Sox' lead to 5-4, putting a stamp on the explosive frame. 

"I felt good," Verdugo said. "I think it was kind of, you know, I just wanted to have less effort in the box, I guess. You know what I mean? I wanted to be a little bit more just seeing the ball and trusting my hands, and I felt like I was able to do that today and just felt a lot more free in the box. You know, instead of trying to force something or you know, get muscley to the ball I just haven't really been making a lot of two good passes to the ball. So today was a lot better in the box just you know, slowing down my body and, you know, obviously now build anytime you can save a run and you know, get a guy out is huge and, you know, just help your pitchers is big."

The five-run, five-hit bottom of the seventh was almost cathartic for the Boston offense, which has gone comatose for the better part of a month, particularly in the last week. 

"Oh, [that inning] felt great. I felt great," Verdugo said. "Everybody contributed. Everybody came in. They went to the bullpen, well, I think two times. We started off with the starter [Austin Gomber] and got to two relievers [Brent Suter and Peter Lambert]. So you know, it was a really good inning. And, you know, that's kind of like what makes this offense so good and why we were so good for so long, too, is we had a lot of endings like that. Just next guy up, that kind of mentality."

Cora had been waiting for an inning like that "for a while. We put good at-bats, and the walks and hitting the ball the other way. … The one thing about all this stuff is we’re pitching. That’s the cool thing about it. Earlier in the season, we didn’t pitch, but we were hitting. Obviously, over 162, if you pitch, you’re going to have a chance. You saw [Garrett Whitlock] today. You saw [Josh Winckowski]. That’s nine innings from two kids, and they did a good job. So, enjoy the off day and be ready for Friday.” 

Verdugo is now off-leash, and Devers and the rest of the lineup appear to have some semblance of momentum after back-to-back six-run outings. 

On Tuesday Cora banked on Boston's fortunes "going the other way" at some point. They did on Wednesday to snap a two-game skid and salvage a win against the lowly Rockies. Now, the Red Sox are hoping to be fully free of their own doghouse when the Yankees come to town this weekend.

"I feel like you know, the record's ... the record's hard you know, you can overlook a record, right? But like when you go, and you look at our games, like we're a very talented group," Verdugo said. "We have guys that can do everything from pitchers to hitters to defensive guys, and we're just all trying to fire at the same time, just get on the right page and just have a nice little streak going. I think for us, it's just kind of staying positive, right? Staying positive, being about your teammates and wanting the next guy to succeed and make it easier for you. I think today was something that helped with that."