Rare Stumble From Red Sox Bullpen Leads To First Series Loss Since June

The Red Sox are playing a few men short, and it’s come at a difficult time. The 13-inning, marathon game on Thursday night required Brayan Bello to throw three innings, limiting his availability today. It also led to Greg Weissert being optioned to bring up Raymond Burgos to provide length, which he did for two days before being optioned for Seth Martinez. Martinez isn’t exactly a trusted arm at this point; bringing him in to a close game would only be done by necessity.

On Sunday (and Saturday), the lack of rotation depth caught up to the Red Sox. With no starter available, the Red Sox needed six pitchers to get 27 outs. It nearly worked, as the Red Sox led the game after eight innings. Unfortunately, Garrett Whitlock and Aroldis Chapman are human, and both scuffled on Sunday. Whitlock nearly pitched a scoreless inning, but a bloop single and double just out of the reach of Jarren Duran tied the game. In the ninth inning with the game tied and two outs, Aroldis Chapman had Donovan Walton picked off, but Willson Contreras’ throw to second wound up in the outfield, and the inning continued. Max Muncy promptly doubled, and the Athletics had a lead. While the defense let Chapman down, he wasn’t particularly sharp. Whitlock and Chapman are each in the top five in appearances since the second half began, and pitch exclusively in high-pressure situations. Those two will continue to be effective, but the Red Sox need more length from the rotation to navigate a difficult stretch of the schedule.

Of course, the offense can bail out the bullpen on any given day. Today, that didn’t happen. They managed to score four runs on Sunday, but lacked any power and primarily moved station to station, taking extra bases with their speed. Small ball has shown up in big moments for the Red Sox, but it’s actually the home run ball that’s propelled the turnaround. Since the All-Star break, the Red Sox have 33 home runs, the third most in baseball over that span. Today, Wilyer Abreu hit a ball that looked like it had a chance, but was caught in right field for a sacrifice fly. Besides that, the contact was mostly weak, and Boston didn’t record a single extra-base hit. That meant the team couldn’t turn to Seth Martinez for a reprieve, and the high-leverage arms faltered on the same day, giving the A’s a 5-4 victory. It’s the first time the Red Sox have lost on back-to-back days since June 21st and 22nd, and the first series they’ve dropped since the end-of-June series against the Nationals.

Sonny Gray will go tomorrow against the Toronto Blue Jays. The next off day is still a week away, but Adley Rutschman could be returning to add some thump to the offense.

Brayan Bello (4 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 4 K)

Eli White (3-4)

Tyron Guerrero/Jovani Moran (2 IP, 0 ER)

Willson Contreras (0-2, 2 HBP, Error)

Jarren Duran (0-3)

Ceddanne Rafaela (0-5)