Red Sox Price Goes Down, But Not To Tanaka

Boston Red Sox starting pitcher David Price picked up the loss against the New York Yankees, but fans need to remember that he didn’t lose to Masahiro Tanaka.

Sunday night’s game at Yankee Stadium was a tight affair, where every pitch and every at-bat counted. Price had a bad fourth inning and, by his own admission, he could have executed better. However, to say that Tanaka outpitched Price is part of one of the more elusive falsehoods of baseball. Fans look at a ‘pitchers’ duel’ and believe that the winning pitcher was better.

Last time anyone checked, nobody saw Tanaka pick up a bat against Price.

But a loss is a loss, right? Well, not when one looks at the long-term effects of a single performance. Price got hit 11 times, allowing three earned runs in 5.2 innings of work. While Price struck out only one batter, Tanaka struck out seven Red Sox batters, while allowing three hits and one earned run in six innings. Three runs to one sounds like pretty simple math; however, those numbers only scratch the surface of what went on last night. In terms of the balls put into play, Price induced nine groundouts to only three flyballs, while Tanaka got only two grounders and six flyouts.

In fact, Tanaka was lit up in the first inning by Boston’s second baseman Dustin Pedroia for a home run and an early lead. Red Sox fans may only remember the Price issues in the bottom of the fourth inning, but the top of the first inning looked like a nightmare for Yankees fans at first. While Pedroia’s homer was a solo-shot, the three outs were also smacked hard. Out of the four batters he faced, Tanaka was drilled to left and center field for flyouts and the final out, David Ortiz, sharply hit a ball that would have been extra bases if not for Jacoby Ellsbury catching it. Tanaka was seen breathing sighs of relief and, what looked to be, cursing himself for almost allowing a big inning under the big lights of Yankee Stadium.

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One could argue that the Red Sox knew it too, and they may have let it get to their heads. Most of the lineup was swinging freely, even at balls low and outside, looking for something to pound out of the ballpark. Almost every ball that was hit was hit very hard, which explains the flyouts, lineouts, and the strikeouts. Not to pin it solely on him, but Hanley Ramirez, for example, fouled the first pitch thrown to him, an 86-mph slider, which didn’t fool him at all. He shifted his weight and caught it off the end of the bat, hoping to put the ball in play, even though the pitch was nowhere near a good spot in the strike zone to hit it. Many at-bats were the same, aggressive swings at early pitches, which would have made for a ton of offense if they would have connected with the pitches properly.

The top of the third inning was a great example of this strategy, as it only took Tanaka eight pitches to get out of the frame. It took two pitches for Mookie Betts to fly out, and Pedroia lined out on the very next pitch. Sometimes, hitters do need to be aggressive; however, when the lineup is giving the opposing pitcher an easier time by not making him throw as many pitches the team’s own starter, one cannot expect to succeed very often. Such was the case last night, as Price threw 106 pitches, 77 for strikes, while Tanaka threw only 87 pitches, 58 for strikes. Those figures have Price throwing 72% of his pitches for strikes and Tanaka, falling shorter of the strike zone, at 67%.

Don’t expect any excuses from Price, who was quick to take the proverbial sword to himself after the game. Scott Lauber of ESPN reported Price blaming himself, saying, “Even when I was ahead [in the count], I couldn’t execute whatever pitch I was throwing to get an out […] That’s tough. You guys are tired of hearing it, and I’m tired of saying it: I’ve got to execute.” Price added, “The 100-plus pitches, I didn’t throw a good fastball in to a righty the entire day. Whenever I don’t command that pitch on that side of the plate, that’s when it causes a lot of problems for myself.”

Lauber believes that the real issue for Price was the fact that he couldn’t put away Starlin Castro in the fourth, “with one on and one out in the fourth inning. After getting down two strikes, Castro fouled off a fastball and a cutter, laid off a changeup in the dirt and lined a changeup to left field for a game-tying RBI double. Then, after striking out Rob Refsnyder, Price gave up an RBI single to No. 9-hitting Austin Romine, a single to Brett Gardner and an RBI single to Jacoby Ellsbury.”

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Up until that point, both pitchers faced about the same amount of batters, Price facing 13 and Tanaka facing 12. Yet, Tanaka, at that point, was losing the game. That’s why baseball is a team game: pitchers can’t do it all. At least not in the American League, where pitchers don’t hit. The Yankees simply had better, more patient at-bats than the Red Sox did. The Bronx Bombers were only 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position, but it was enough to beat Boston’s 0-for-2, with only four runners left on base.

Nobody would dispute that Price deserved the loss and Tanaka the win, but the ‘duel’ could easily have went in the other direction. While Tanaka was getting cranked, a few solid hits grouped at the same time were all that it took for Price’s undoing. Inconsistency with the fastball was the clear problem, but Price’s issue was not as troubling as the consistent aggression at the plate that seemed to take the Red Sox out of their offensive groove. Price can work on the mechanics, but the bats can’t do much if they don’t switch up their strategies, depending on the situation. Tanaka beat the Red Sox, not just Price. Or, maybe more appropriately, Price and the rest of the Red Sox beat themselves last night.