There’s little Red Sox legend Roger Clemens didn’t do in his 24-year MLB career, which included 11 All-Star seasons, seven Cy Young awards and ERA titles, 1986 American League MVP, two Triple Crowns, and a pair of World Series rings.
But in his first career game in his father’s first big-league ballpark on Saturday evening, Kody Clemens did something ‘Rocket’ never could:
Hit a home run.
As the elder Clemens watched from a suite above the diamond, his son’s two-run homer to deep right gave the visiting Minnesota Twins a 3-1 lead in the sixth.
It was the cherry on top of a sluggish, frustrating rain-delayed loss to the visiting Minnesota Twins in which the Red Sox went 2 for 8 with runners in scoring position and left 10 men base to lose 4-3.
The Sox are now 4-8 in one-run games.
Recalled from Triple-A Worcester amidst Walker Buehler’s stint on the injured list with shoulder inflammation, Hunter Dobbins went 5.2 innings, gave up four earned runs on seven hits, walked two, struck out two, and hit a batter. He threw 92 pitches, 59 for strikes in his third career big-league start.
The rookie right-hander made easy work of the Twins lineup in his first time through the order. Dobbins needed just seven pitches to set the visitors down 1-2-3 in the first. He worked around a two-out double in the second, and got the Twins 1-2-3 again in the third.
The Twins were prepared the second time around. Ty France’s RBI groundout tied the game 1-1 in the fourth. Dobbins escaped a bases-loaded jam in the fifth by getting Carlos Correa to fly out, but he couldn’t hide from the Twins any more than the ballpark could hide from the rapidly-darkening skies. While the club’s Triple-A WooSox went into a rain delay in Worcester, Dobbins took the mound at Fenway for his sixth and final frame. He recorded two outs, plunking France in between, then got crushed by Clemens.
Once Harrison Bader became the first big-leaguer to record a hit against Dobbins’ splitter and longtime Sox catcher Christian Vazquez drew a walk, Cora came out to the mound to get his rookie starter. Brennan Bernardino allowed leadoff man Trevor Larnach to drive in one of Dobbins’ runners with an RBI single before getting out of the inning.
The Twins went 1-2-3 against Bernardino and Greg Weissert in the seventh, with an hour and 12 minutes of rain delay mixed in.
Boston benefitted from the pause, which cut Bailey Ober’s start short. The Twins righty entered the contest with a 1.59 ERA over three starts against the Sox, then held them to one earned run on seven hits, one walk, and six strikeouts in six innings. Though Ober was already at 94 pitches (62 strikes) and likely wouldn’t have pitched much longer, the rain delay was still a welcome break.
Hours after Cora shut down the possibility of experimenting with Rafael Devers at first base, Boston’s new designated hitter lived up to his job title. He carried the lineup with three hits, his second consecutive three-hit game.
Romy Gonzalez, now one of the team’s regular first basemen after Triston Casas’ season-ending injury the night before, had three hits as well. Jarren Duran had the team’s only other multi-hit performance, going 2 for 5 with two runs and one batted in.
Wilyer Abreu’s struggles in the four-spot continued. The Red Sox right fielder made the inning-ending out in the first, third, and seventh, stranding at least one runner each time. Trevor Story’s cold spell persists, too; he struck out three times.
Making his 600th career appearance in the top of the ninth, veteran southpaw Justin Wilson worked around Byron Buxton’s one-out single to keep the Red Sox within a run.
Ceddanne Rafaela led off the ninth with a single off Jhoan Duran, and advanced to second on Jarren Duran’s groundout. The Sox center fielder then watched from scoring position as Devers struck out swinging himself into a pretzel.
Having seen Abreu struggle throughout the contest, the Twins walked Alex Bregman to force the Sox outfielder into the deciding at-bat. Abreu flew out to left to end one last inning.