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