Boston Red Sox Drop Second Game of Weekend Series Against St Louis Cardinals 7-3
By Zachary McMahon –
The Boston Red Sox played the second game of the series against the St. Louis Cardinals on Saturday night after dropping the opener on Friday night.
Garrett Cooper got the night off as Tyler O’Neil played in the designated hitter spot in the game, which allowed Ceddane Rafaela to play in center field, moved Duran over to left field and David Hamliton to play shortstop for the second straight game.
Kutter Crawford started the game on the mound for the Sox, where he went 5 ⅔ innings, where he only allowed a home run by Nolan Gorman in the second inning. He also allowed six hits, two walks and struck out five batters. Crawford ended the night with having a 2.17 ERA, which is the fifth lowest by a Sox starting pitcher since 2000 in his first ten starts of the season. The lowest two ERAs are both held by Pedro Martinez with 1.05 in 2000 and 1.60 in 2001. It is the lowest since 2013, when Clay Bucholz had a 1.73 ERA in his first ten starts of the 2013 season, according to J.P. Long, Red Sox Director of Baseball Communications & Media Relations. .
Devers hit a homer for the fourth straight game as he tied the game up at one with a solo homer in the fourth inning. Devers also extended his hit streak to eight games and has reached base in 12 straight games. This is the third time that he has hit a homer in four straight games in his career as he most recently did it between June 11-15, 2022.
If he plays and hits a homer in Sunday’s game it will tie the Sox record for longest streak of home runs, which has been tied six times, with most recently Bobby Dalbec in 2020. That was Devers’s 180th career home run as he passed Nomar Garciaparra for most homers in a Sox uniform with the homer in Friday’s game.
In the next few innings, Connor Wong caught Michael Siani stealing second on a throw to Hamliton. Then after Brennan Bernadino came in to finish the sixth inning, he threw a wild pitch that hit the wall at the backstop which enabled Wong to throw to Devers when Nolan Arenado was advancing on the pitch, as Arenado would be thrown out to end the inning.
In the seventh, Bernardino allowed two singles to Mason Winn and Dylan Carlson, who pinch hit for Siani, then Bernardino trying to pick off Winn over at second, missed Hamliton and Winn advanced to third on the error. After a walk to Brendan Donovan, Lars Nootbar hit an RBI groundout while the bases were loaded and scored Winn home for the Cardinals to take back the lead. After that, Justin Slaten came in and finished off the inning, as Paul Goldschmidt would ground out to shortstop to end the inning
In the eighth, Romy Gonzalez pinch hit for Hamliton to lead off the inning, as he hit towards left, Gonzalez tried for second and performed a swim move on Gorman, however after a review Gonzalez was still out at second due to not being enough evidence to change the original call.
After Rafaela grounded out for the second out, Duran hit a single and Rob Refsnyder, who pinch hit for Wilyer Abreu had an RBI double that tied the game at two.
Unfortunately for Slaten, he got batted around in the eighth as he allowed four earned runs to come home. It was by RBI singles by Ivan Herrera and Gorman, and a sacrifice fly by Winn. Slaten was able to strikeout Carlson, but was taken out of the game after an infield single by Donovan.
After Zack Kelly came in, Lars Nootbaar was able to drive in two more runs due to an error by Refsnyder over in right field, as the Sox have now had an error in each of the last five games, seven in total as they have two fielding errors in two games during that stretch.
Dominic Smith would hit into a double play to end the game as the Cardinals would win against the Red Sox 7-3. Justin Slaten is credited with the loss while Jo Jo Romero was credited with the victory for the Cardinals as he gets his first win of the season.
The Red Sox and the Cardinals will be leading off the day tomorrow at 1:05 pm as it is the first ever game streamed exclusively to Roku for free. It will be Nick Pivetta going up against Matthew Liberatore on the mound tomorrow.
