As Roman Anthony's season is in doubt, Guardians pounce on Red Sox, Hicks early in series-finale thumping

The Red Sox stumbled badly on Wednesday night, following a disastrous six-run second inning and a quiet offensive performance in an 8-1 loss to the Guardians at Fenway Park.

Boston chose to use a bullpen game in the series finale against Cleveland, but their strategy backfired. The Guardians racked up five hits, including a two-run homer from Gabriel Arias, and capitalized off two fielding miscues and led 7-0 after two frames.

Jordan Hicks continues to offer the Red Sox uninspiring innings out of the bullpen and watched his ERA inflate to 8.20 in 21 appearances for Boston. The hard-throwing right-hander allowed four runs on four hits (one homer) while recording just one out. Opponents are batting .321 against him, and he’s given up 20 runs (17 earned runs), 25 hits, and 12 walks while striking out 15 in 18 2/3 innings.

"We've got to figure him out," said Alex Cora. "We need him. That's the bottom line. Because we've got Whitlock as a setup man, we need righties in the bullpen to do their job. We trust the ability, but we have to execute."

Hicks has two years left on his four-year, $44-million deal he originally signed with the Giants. If the Red Sox weren't responsible for his $11 million AAV, it's likely that they would be considering other options for the reliever.

Brennan Bernardino opened the game, recording just two outs, and Steven Matz came in following Hicks to try and clean up his mess and gave up two runs (one earned) off one hit in an inning of work. Zack Kelly was the lone bright spot for Cora’s bullpen, tossing four innings and allowing just two hits with four strikeouts.

“He did a good job, pitched well, and competed,” Cora said to reporters postgame about Kelly’s performance. “He threw 33 pitches four days ago (for Worcester), and he went up to (63). We needed that. Obviously, we didn’t do much offensively. But he gave us a chance to try to get something going, so that was really good.”

Kelly’s four innings and 63 pitches in the game were both career highs.

“I think it’s just part of understanding my role,” said Kelly. “Coming up here with the expanded roster, it’s trying to give some other guys (on the staff) a break. I felt good; I was happy with how everything was going, so I was fully planning on going as long as I had to. Whenever AC told me told to stop, I was going to stop.”

Kelly continued, “I haven’t done that in quite a while,” he said. “After the third inning, pitching coach Andrew Bailey asked me where I was at body-wise, and I said, ‘I’m fine.’ Kind of like I did when I was a starter, you kind of get in that groove and you just let it rock.”

Dustin May went three innings, allowing one earned run off three hits with two walks and a strikeout.

The Sox were without a starter for the series finale after deciding to push rookie Payton Tolle to Friday night in Arizona. Cora also said the club wanted to move May to the bullpen for this week to stay in turn with the others in the rotation. May is expected to return to the rotation next week.

Kyle Harrison was initially expected to join the Red Sox and possibly pitch in the game, but he underwent an MRI on his ankle and returned back to Triple-A Worcester.

“It’s unfortunate. I’m disappointed that I couldn’t be out there,” Harrison told the Worcester Telegram & Gazette on Wednesday after returning to Polar Park. “But at the same time, I got to be right. It’s the best thing for the team.”

Despite the Red Sox having already won the series by taking the first two games, curious minds have to wonder why Boston punted the series finale with a bullpen game. It feels like the front office mismanaged their pitching options; for example, Chris Murphy, who has been starting games for Worcester, going three innings in each of his last two starts, could have been a better fit than Bernardino and Hicks.

With Roman Anthony presumably lost for the remainder of the regular season due to an oblique injury, the Red Sox offense had no answers for Guardians starter Joey Cantillo. Boston plated one run in the fourth on an RBI single by Nick Sogard. 

The Sox’ offense went 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position and never put together any serious threat in the game.

The Guardians received a strong pitching performance from Cantillo (4-3), who limited Boston to a run on five hits in six innings. He struck out seven and walked two. Steven Kwan had three hits in the win, and C.J. Kayfus and Bo Naylor each added two hits for Cleveland. In the second inning, All-Star third baseman Jose Ramirez tapped a ball a few feet up the first base line, and as he was trying to make a plan, Connor Wong bumped into Ramirez trying to pick up the ball. As confusion rained down, the umpires charged Wong with interference, and Brayan Rocchio, who initially scored on the play, had his run counted.

The Red Sox will benefit from an off day on Thursday before starting a series on the road with the Diamondbacks. 

Tolle (0-0, 3.38) is scheduled to face former Red Sox lefty Eduardo Rodriguez (6-8, 5.40) in Friday’s opener.