Red Sox limp home after rain-soaked loss to Pirates caps another series defeat

A lengthy rain delay only prolonged what had already become a miserable Sunday afternoon for the Red Sox.

Patrick Sandoval was knocked around early, the offense remained stuck in its recent funk, and Boston sat through a delay of more than two and a half hours before the Pirates finished off an 8-3 win at PNC Park.

The Sox have now lost seven of their last nine games and three consecutive series, a sudden reversal for a team that had won nine straight series during its remarkable summer turnaround.

Sandoval had generally given the Red Sox a chance to win whenever he took the mound this season. Boston entered Sunday 5-1 in his starts.

This time around, the southpaw put his team in an immediate hole.

The Pirates strung together three consecutive one-out hits in the first inning to grab a 2-0 lead before things completely unraveled in the third. Pittsburgh opened the inning with four straight hits and added two more after the first out as the lead ballooned to 7-0.

Sandoval remained in the game despite the deficit, largely in part to the Sox potentially facing a bullpen game Monday night at Fenway Park, interim manager Chad Tracy needed to avoid burning through his relievers.

Sandoval ultimately needed 89 pitches to get through just four innings, allowing seven earned runs on nine hits and three walks while striking out six.

“That's a good team we just played,” Tracy said. “Watching what they can do offensively, some of the arms coming out of the 'pen that are all throwing 100 miles an hour. There's a lot of good players over there.”

There aren’t many offenses capable of regularly overcoming seven-run deficits, but Boston’s lineup didn’t exactly put up much resistance, either.

The Red Sox thought they had caught a break when Pittsburgh pushed reigning National League Cy Young winner Paul Skenes back to Wednesday to give him additional rest. Instead, Boston did little against replacement starter Lake Bachar or Hunter Barco, who entered with a 7.36 ERA and handled the bulk of the innings. The two relievers combined to toss six innings, allowing three runs on four hits with two walks and eight strikeouts. 

Former Red Sox prospect Nick Yorke also did some damage against his former organization Sunday.

Recalled from Triple-A Indianapolis earlier in the day, Yorke went 2-for-4 with three RBI. His bases-loaded single in the third drove home Bryan Reynolds and Brandon Lowe to extend Pittsburgh’s lead to 6-0. Yorke struck again in the eighth, adding an RBI single to make it 8-3 and put the finishing touches on the Pirates’ win.

Connor Wong provided essentially all of Boston’s offense with a three-run homer in the fifth.

The Red Sox scored more than four runs just once during their seven-game trip through Toronto and Pittsburgh, when they beat the Blue Jays 7-0 on Thursday. In the other six games, Boston scored one, three, four, four, four and three runs, which didn't cut it this week for the Sox. 

The offense has gone cold almost as quickly as it heated up during Boston’s extended run through July and early August.

Newcomer Adley Rutschman remains in the middle of those struggles.

Rutschman went 0-for-3 Sunday and is now just 1-for-17 (.059) with nine strikeouts and no RBI through his first five games with the Red Sox. He struck out seven times during the three-game series in Pittsburgh alone.

“I think the competitor in me, I want to go out there and perform,” said Rutschman. “Bottom line: I want to perform for these guys and come out here and be able to do what I do. But at the end of the day, you have to really stick with your approach or else baseball is a game of failure and can get you in a bad mindset quickly.”

Before the game, Tracy said Rutschman’s issue hasn’t necessarily been chasing pitches outside the strike zone. Instead, the catcher has struggled to catch up to pitches he’s choosing to attack.

After missing time with left wrist inflammation and receiving only a brief rehab assignment with Worcester, Rutschman is still searching for his timing.

“Baseball, it's a game of adjustments,” Rutschman said. “So I’m just trying to work every day towards my process. That's always been my approach from a hitting standpoint. Just trying to stay with my process, not make any drastic changes. Just that one thing that clicks and gets you back to barreling balls.”

Boston’s execution wasn’t much better elsewhere as Nick Sogard attempted to bunt his way aboard to begin the game but pushed the ball directly toward Bachar for an easy out.

An inning later, the Red Sox put their first two hitters aboard before Andruw Monasterio attempted a sacrifice bunt. His bunt rolled foul, and when he swung away, he grounded into a double play that effectively killed the threat.

For a team that successfully incorporated small ball during its hot streak, even those little things haven’t been going Boston’s way lately.

One player on Sunday did his job, and that was left-handed reliever Raymond Burgos.

After Sandoval’s short start, Burgos entered and provided exactly what the Red Sox needed from him.

The southpaw tossed two scoreless, hitless innings before the rain arrived. Then, remarkably, after sitting through a delay of more than two and a half hours, Burgos returned to the mound and gave Boston two more innings.

He allowed Pittsburgh’s final run but covered four innings in total, preserving the rest of a bullpen that has already lost Garrett Whitlock and Justin Slaten to elbow issues.

It’s the second consecutive weekend in which Burgos has bailed out the pitching staff. He threw three innings on consecutive days against the Athletics last weekend and once again provided length Sunday when Boston desperately needed it.

“Huge,” Tracy said. “A long, long wait, although he only had about 20-some pitches before, but a long wait nonetheless. And he was pacing around saying, ‘I’m ready to go and continue.’ So huge as far as keeping the bullpen on line going into the homestand, with the off-day (Thursday) lingering, too.”

The Red Sox were also without Willson Contreras, who received the day off as the club continues to manage a minor hamstring strain.

Tracy said Contreras had been feeling better earlier in the week before experiencing some renewed tightness over the last few days. Playing four games on the artificial turf in Toronto may not have helped matters.

Sogard started at first base in his absence as he's done when Contreras has not been in the lineup. 

Boston will now head home after a 2-5 road trip that looked nothing like the baseball the Red Sox were playing before they left Fenway Park.

Nine consecutive series wins have been followed by three consecutive series losses. Seven losses have come in nine games, and an offense that was pounding opposing pitching less than two weeks ago is suddenly struggling to generate much of anything.

“I think we’re more than anything like, having some spots where we’re having trouble cashing any big, whether it’s a big two-out hit or whether it’s a one-out hit with multiple runners in scoring position, that’s been the biggest thing,” Tracy said. “Not for lack of traffic, but we got to get ourselves going, and get some of those hittable pitches and hit ’em, and knock some runs in. But there is still plenty of opportunity out there, there’s no question about that.”

The Red Sox will try to get things straightened out at Fenway, where they’ll begin a six-game homestand Monday against the Diamondbacks.

Boston will use an opener in lefty Alex Gamboa (0-0, 1.59 ERA), and will potentially counter with Brayan Bello to provide the bulk innings. Arizona will counter with left-hander Mitch Bratt (1-1, 3.74 ERA). First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 p.m. ET.