The Sox played the earliest game of the season yesterday with the 11am Patriots Day start. The Sox were holding a 2-1 lead in the series and had Clay Buchholz up against Wei-Yin Chen for the O’s. To say that Buchholz struggled would be a gross understatement. Buch didn’t make it out of the 3rd inning and left the Sox in a huge hole. The bats tried to rally and make up for it, but fell just a tad short and ended up splitting the series.
Buchholz didn’t give up a run until the 3rd inning, but once the gates opened he couldn’t get them closed. Buchholz suddenly just couldn’t get anyone out and runs were scoring all over the place. Buch gave up an RBI single to Markakis, RBI single to Cruz, RBI single to Davis, RBI groundout to Jones, an RBI double to Clevenger and an RBI single to Schoop. Sox 0-6. It was horrible to watch. Farrell came out to get him and Clay’s outing was over. Buchholz’s pitching line for the day was a horrific 55 pitches, 2.1 IP, 7 H, 6 R, 1 BB and 1 K. Burke Badenhop was in the game and got quickly stopped the bleeding with a double play to end the inning.
Badenhop took one for the team and pitched through the 6th inning without giving up a run. The Sox bats finally got on the scoreboard in the 5th inning when they got to Chen. Bradley Jr hit an RBI ground rule double, Brock Holt hit an RBI sac fly and Pedey hit an RBI double. Sox 3-6. Craig Breslow took the mound in the 7th and pitched a scoreless inning. The Sox were able to get a little bit closer to the O’s when David Ross hit a solo HR in the bottom of the 7th. Sox 4-6. The O’s grabbed that run right back in the top of the 8th when Breslow gave up an RBI single to Flaherty. Sox 4-7. Napoli hit a solo HR in the bottom of the inning to have the Sox trailing 5-7. The Sox had a chance to go for more, but because of a bonehead base running error by Xander Bogaerts getting caught for the 3rd out, the rally was over.
Andrew Miller came out and pitched a crisp scoreless 9th inning before the Sox bats tried to have a rally in the bottom of the inning. The Sox ended up having the bases loaded with one out against O’s closer Tommy Hunter and Napoli hit an RBI groundout to have the Sox within one run. Sox 6-7. Mike Carp would not be able to be a hero and groundout to 1st base to end the game.
Red Sox 6 Orioles 7 BOXSCORE
WP: Chen (3-1) LP: Buchholz (0-2) SV: Hunter (5)
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