The Boston Red Sox offense has been slacking through the first two games in Oakland. Can they turn it around tonight against the A’s?
The Boston Red Sox have not scored a run in 18 innings of baseball. Since arriving in Oakland, Boston has seen their bats dissolve, and in turn has watched the offense that was the best in baseball just one season ago, fall silent.
That is a tactic that certainly needs to change going forward, as Boston fell in the series opener against the A’s 7-0, and again last night 1-0 as they failed to get starter Chris Sale any run support. Last night’s outing was the first quality start by any Red Sox starter all season, and granted we’re just six games in, but that’s a slight issue.
Boston’s record has sputtered to 1-5 and is tied with the Angels for the worst record in baseball. Is it time to hit the panic button yet? No, but it’s getting closer. Every night, it seems there’s something that goes wrong for these Red Sox. Whether it’s a replay, a deflection off a glove, a ball falling foul, or a called third strike, it seems that pins never fall in the right direction for Boston.
Regardless of the pitching woes thus far, the offense needs to be able to score at least 2 runs in a game like last night. The top four hitters in the lineup in this series against Oakland are a combined 5-for-31. That should raise a red flag in the mind of Alex Cora, and maybe that should signal the end of the ‘Devers bats in the 3-hole’ experiment.
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Xander Bogaerts is the only member of the lineup with a multi-hit game in the series and seems to be in a comfort zone at the plate, and moving him up in the order can’t hurt. At this point, they’ve got to try something, and it can’t be any worse than the results posted thus far.
Tonight, the task doesn’t get any easier as the A’s are expected to send right-hander Marco Estrada to the hill, someone the Red Sox know very well. The former Blue Jay has great stuff, a mid-90’s fastball and solid breaking pitches that helps him keep hitters guessing.
He’ll be matched by Red Sox starter Nathan Eovaldi who’s making his second start of the season and may be coming into tonight erring on the side of caution after giving up 6 earned runs the last time we saw him in Seattle.
Perhaps Sale set the trend last night with his quality outing, and after all, things can only go up from here.
Boston has 5 games remaining on this west coast swing to begin the season before returning to Boston for the home opener at Fenway Park on April 9th. Hopefully, the bats will be woken up by then, but it you’ve got to start somewhere, and it needs to be sooner rather than later.