In his season debut, Garrett Whitlock looked like several other Red Sox starting pitchers in their own debuts two weeks ago.
Outgunned by a low-budget American League East rival.
The Baltimore Orioles lit up Corey Kluber and Chris Sale, and the Tampa Bay Rays gave Whitlock a thorough dunking in the Trop’s fish tank on their way to their 11th consecutive victory, 7-2.
After the Red Sox and Rays carried a scoreless battle into the bottom of the eighth on Monday, the Rays took an early 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first, and continued scoring in four of the next eight innings. Rob Refsnyder almost gave Whitlock a clean inning with a stupendous diving catch, but was unable to keep Wander Franco’s ball in his glove. It was eerily reminiscent of Adam Duvall’s ninth-inning incident on Sunday in Detroit, which fractured his wrist. Thankfully, Refsnyder emerged unscathed.
The game got away from Whitlock in the bottom of the fifth, when he allowed back-to-back home runs to put the Rays ahead 5-0. At that point in the game, the Rays’ run differential for the season sat at plus-63.
His day was done after that. All in all, the 26-year-old righty allowed five earned runs on eight hits, struck out five, and didn’t issue a walk. He threw 85 pitches, 62 for strikes, but only induced 11 swings and misses, compared to Rays starter Shane McClanahan’s 23.
Did Major League Baseball reintroduce juiced balls this year? Something is certainly afoot.
The Rays have hit 29 home runs already this year, tying the 2000 St. Louis Cardinals for the most by any team through their first 11 games. After only having one four-homer game last season, they have three in their first 11 games. Before the road trip, Alex Cora said he’d never seen anything like the way the balls were flying out of Fenway Park during the first homestand.
But while the Rays look like they’re dining at the juice bar, the Red Sox are parched lately.
Despite allowing an atypical four walks (he only issued 38 in 166 ⅓ innings last year), McClanahan struck out nine and carried a no-hitter into the fifth, when Bobby Dalbec spoiled his fun with a one-out, 113.7 mph single.
Unfortunately, breaking up the no-no bid was akin to a drop in the bucket. McClanahan only allowed one earned run on two hits, and by game’s end, the Red Sox had only collected two runs on six hits and struck out 10 times. They squandered plenty of free chances, too; the Rays gave them five walks, and the Red Sox responded by going 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position, stranding eight men.
A glimmer of a Hail Mary rally in the ninth ended in disconcerting fashion. With two runners on and two outs, Kiké Hernández struck out. He’s now 0 for his last 27, and Alex Cora says he or Christian Arroyo will have a day off Wednesday.
The only bright side was stolen bases, which have been have a fiasco for the Red Sox thus far. Entering Tuesday, runners were 16-for-16 in stolen-base attempts against them, and they were one of six teams that hadn’t quelled a single steal this year. Connor Wong ended that streak early in the game, successfully throwing out two runners at second base. The Rays even attempted to challenge the latter, but lost.
But once again, the Red Sox are under .500. And they have no clear path to disarming their inexplicably out-of-this-world division rivals.
The Red Sox play two more at the Trop, on Wednesday at 6:40 p.m., and Thursday at 1:10 p.m., then return home for a weekend that’s deeply meaningful to the city of Boston and the league.
As they host the Los Angeles Angels for four-game set, they’ll observe Jackie Robinson Day and the10th anniversary of the Boston Marathon Bombing on Saturday. The series finale is Marathon Monday/Patriots Day, and Shohei Ohtani is slated to take the mound for the annual mid-morning game.