Payton Tolle dominates, Caleb Durbin delivers grand slam as Red Sox snap five-game skid

The Red Sox desperately needed someone to stop the bleeding Thursday afternoon.

One start after overpowering the Athletics with a career-high 14 strikeouts, rookie Payton Tolle was the stopper the Red Sox needed Thursday, dominating the Blue Jays lineup with eight shutout innings. 

Caleb Durbin finally gave him some breathing room, blowing open a one-run game with a grand slam in the eighth to send Boston to a 7-0 win over the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre.

The victory snapped Boston’s five-game losing streak and prevented its first four-game sweep since mid-June, which also came against Toronto. The Red Sox improved to 65-56 and recorded their 12th shutout of the season.

After generating 24 swings and misses in his previous start, Tolle managed only six Thursday. He didn’t record his first strikeout until the sixth inning.

The left-hander allowed just two hits and two walks over eight innings, needing only 91 pitches as he bullied the Blue Jays' lineup. He retired the final 17 batters he faced and 21 of the last 23.

It was the complete opposite of the overpowering performance he delivered six days earlier, but every bit as effective.

“We needed a deep start,” interim manager Chad Tracy told reporters. “He’s fantastic.”

Tolle wasn’t quite as sharp initially. His velocity was down a couple of ticks in the first inning, and three of the first six Blue Jays he faced reached base on two walks and a single.

A pair of 5-4-3 double plays started by Durbin helped Tolle through the second and third innings, and from there, Toronto essentially stopped reaching base.

Tolle cruised through five scoreless innings on just 52 pitches without recording a strikeout. He finally picked up his first when he caught Charles McAdoo looking for the second out of the sixth, added two more in the seventh and finished his afternoon by getting Myles Straw to chase outside the zone to end the eighth.

With Boston monitoring the rookie’s workload, Tracy elected not to send him back out for the ninth. Greg Weissert, recalled from Worcester before the game, finished off the shutout.

The Red Sox grabbed a 1-0 lead against Max Scherzer in the first inning when Wilyer Abreu worked an eight-pitch walk with two outs and Willson Contreras followed by driving an RBI double into the right-center field gap.

That remained the game's only run for the next six innings until Ceddanne Rafaela and Abreu opened the eighth with consecutive singles against Chase Lee. 

Contreras then did something he hadn’t done since 2019, dropping down a sacrifice bunt to move both runners into scoring position.

Toronto intentionally walked Masataka Yoshida, which was the first intentional walk of his career, to load the bases for Durbin.

Durbin jumped on his opportunity and launched a 99.7 mph drive 384 feet into the left-field seats for a grand slam, turning Boston’s precarious 1-0 lead into a 5-0 advantage. It was Durbin’s second grand slam in just 10 days after entering last week without one in his major league career.

Durbin finished 3-for-5 with a career-high five RBI and also reached on an error. His second hit with runners in scoring position came in the ninth, when he added an RBI single. Yoshida chipped in a sacrifice fly as Boston stretched the lead to 7-0.

The Red Sox finished 2-for-7 with runners in scoring position and stranded nine, but Durbin made sure those missed opportunities didn’t matter.

Boston had threatened earlier, loading the bases with two outs in the fourth before coming away empty. They continued creating two-out traffic over the next two innings without adding to their lead.

There was also another questionable baserunning decision from Rafaela. One night after aggressively trying to advance from first to third on a wild pitch and getting thrown out, Rafaela ripped a ball over the third-base bag with two outs in the fifth. He tried stretching the hit into a double, but Andrés Giménez quickly retrieved it and threw him out by a wide margin at second.

Rafaela later provided a scare in the ninth when Lazaro Estrada hit him in the left hand with a 91 mph fastball. He immediately spiked his helmet in pain, prompting Tracy and a trainer to come onto the field, but he remained in the game.

The Red Sox will gladly leave Toronto with a win, but the season series against the Blue Jays was otherwise one they’d probably like to forget. Boston finished just 4-9 against Toronto, losing three of the four series between the teams. The Red Sox are now 19-22 against the American League East.

But after five straight losses, the way they got Thursday’s win mattered more than the season series.

Boston will now head to Pittsburgh for a three-game weekend series against the Pirates at PNC Park.

Rookie southpaw Jake Bennett (7-5, 3.17 ERA) will start Friday’s opener against Bubba Chandler (5-8, 4.26 ERA) at 6:40 p.m. ET. Veteran Sonny Gray will face Jared Jones on Saturday before left-hander Patrick Sandoval and reigning National League Cy Young award winner Paul Skenes close out the series Sunday afternoon.

Whitlock to the IL

The Red Sox aren’t taking any chances with Garrett Whitlock’s elbow.

Boston placed Whitlock on the 15-day injured list Thursday with right elbow inflammation, retroactive to Aug. 10, and recalled Weissert from Triple-A Worcester to take his spot on the roster.

Whitlock was unavailable during Wednesday night’s 6-4 loss to Toronto after experiencing discomfort in his elbow, something he said had gradually been building over the past several weeks. The issue reached a point Tuesday night where his elbow tightened while he was warming in the bullpen.

“I think it’s just the safe move and smart move,” Whitlock told reporters Thursday. “They were telling me, ‘We just need to go and put you on the IL, take care of you and get you back as soon as we can.’”

Given Whitlock’s injury history, Tommy John surgery in 2019 and an internal brace procedure in 2024, any elbow issue naturally raises concern. Whitlock, however, doesn’t believe this feels anything like the injuries that required surgery in the past.

“That’s the nice thing,” he said. “I don’t think we’re worried about it needing surgery or anything like that. It’s not something where I’ve felt anything like I did the previous times I needed surgery. It’s nothing that concerning.”

Whitlock said there are currently no plans for imaging and there’s no firm timetable for his return. He’ll travel with the Red Sox to Pittsburgh before being reassessed when the team returns to Boston.

The workload may have caught up with him having appeared in 17 games over a 38-day stretch from July 3 through Aug. 9, and he acknowledged the soreness had been gradually increasing.

“We’re not gonna put a timeline on it or anything like that,” Whitlock said. “It’s just making sure we get it right.”

There is some hope Whitlock could return for Boston’s series in Miami later this month.

His absence leaves a significant hole at the back end of the bullpen. Whitlock has a 2.05 ERA across 45 appearances and 44 innings this season, striking out 49 while walking only seven.

For now, Tyron Guerrero, Justin Slaten and trade-deadline addition Erik Miller figure to receive more high-leverage opportunities setting up closer Aroldis Chapman.