After being outscored 23-5 between Saturday and Monday, the Red Sox fêted Brayan Bello’s 24th birthday with a barrage of runs in his Wednesday night start.
By the final out of the night, they’d scored 12 runs on 16 hits to win the series with a resounding 12-3 victory.
After Bello worked a 12-pitch, 1-2-3 first inning, the Red Sox took an early 1-0 lead on three consecutive 1-out singles.
The newly-acquired Pablo Reyes was an early and often standout. Batting with the bases loaded in the first, he doubled to extend the lead to 3-0. He doubled again in the second, scoring another pair of runs.
Reyes also made a couple of impressive plays to keep Seattle off the board, including a tremendous catch and relay to first baseman Justin Turner, who was able to make out No. 3, dashing the Mariners’ hopes of capitalizing on a bases-loaded situation.
By the end of the second, Boston had knocked Seattle’s starter, Marco Gonzalez, out of the game (1 ⅔ innings) and taken a 9-0 lead.
Meanwhile, it was a career night for the birthday boy in terms of pitches (107), tying his strikeout record (7), and oddly enough, walks (5). He induced 19 swings & misses, and didn’t allow a hit until the fourth inning. When he exited after five, the Mariners trailed 9-1 and had only collected three hits.
Ryan Sherriff had been warming in the bullpen during the fifth, but after the Red Sox extended their lead to 12-1 in the bottom of the frame, Joely Rodríguez took over for Bello, instead.
Rodríguez was Boston’s first free-agent signing of the offseason, way back in November, but suffered an oblique strain during spring training, landing him on the injured list to start the season. Wednesday night was his season (and Red Sox) debut, and it was clear he was a bit rusty.
That’s what 11-run leads are for.
Rodríguez got the leadoff man out, then walked back-to-back batters and gave up a single to load the bases. A force-out by Julio Rodriguez plated the Mariners’ two other runs of the night.
Chris Martin, Ryan Sherriff, and Justin Garza then took turns pitching scoreless seventh, eighth, and ninth innings, respectively. Other than Sherriff giving up a hit and walk, the Mariners never got on base again.
Other than the surprising number of walks, the Red Sox played a dominant, fairly smooth, solid game. The biggest bombshell came after, when Alex Cora announced that Nick Pivetta would be moving to the bullpen.
Pivetta made two relief appearances for Boston when they faced the Tampa Bay Rays in the 2021 ALDS. He entered Game 1 in the third and allowed three earned runs on four hits, two walks, and four strikeouts over 4 ⅔ innings. The second outing was the more memorable, favorable of the two. When Game 3 went to extras, Pivetta took over in the 10th, and pitched four shutout innings, holding down the fort until Christian Vázquez’s walk-off home run in the 13th.
In the regular season, the 30-year-old righty has 22 career relief appearances under his belt.