The Sox had Chris Sale on the mound, so they had everything to be confident about. Only thing was that the Tigers are the one team that Sale has always struggled against. In fact, Sale has never won a game when he has been stacked up against Justin Verlander. Sale was able to best that demon though as he battled with Verlander and the Sox bats gave him some runs in the bottom of the 7th to give him the win. The Sox ended up tacking on a bunch of runs in the later innings to take a very close game and turn it into a blowout.
The game stayed scoreless until the bottom of the 3rd when the Sox offense scored two runs for Sale. Pedey hit an RBI sac fly and then Moreland hit an RBI single. Sox 2-0. Unfortunately the Tigers got both of those runs back in the top of the 5th. Sale gave up an RBI double to Castellanos and then an RBI groundout to Cabrera. Sox 2-2. The Sox pulled back in front in the bottom of the 5th when Benintendi hit an RBI sac fly, but then the Tigers hit right back in the top of the 6th when Mahtook hit an RBI single. Sox 3-3.
Sale pitched through 7 innings. While he didn’t have dominating stuff, he was able to keep his team in the game and left with a quality start. Lucky for Sale the Sox offense got back on track in the bottom of the 7th and he’d end up in line for the win. Mitch Moreland hit a 2 run RBI double and then Rutledge hit an RBI single to have the Sox leading 6-3. Matt Barnes came out for the 8th inning and had a 1-2-3 inning with 2 Ks. The Sox bats weren’t done yet and ended up 5 more runs in the bottom of the 8th. Bogaerts hit an RBI double, Benintendi hit a 2 run RBI single, Rutledge walked with the bases loaded to force in a run and then Leon hit an RBI sac fly. Sox 11-3. The Sox no longer needed their closer, so Blaine Boyer came in for the 9th. Boyer had an easy, simple 1-2-3 inning to secure the win and give the series to the Sox.
Red Sox 11 Tigers 3 BOXSCORE
WP: Sale (8-2) LP: Saupold (1-1)
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