Friday, April 18, 2014

At Least The Pitching Is Fun To Watch

The Red Sox concluded a 3-4 road trip in Chicago last night with another gritty win, 3-1 over the White Sox.

The Red Sox scoring runs is like trying to get blood from a stone these days, especially Wednesday night's 6-4, 14 inning win, when the Sox were given 15 walks by Chicago, and it took a position player giving up the final two runs for the Red Sox to claim victory.

The Red Sox are hitting .232 as a team in the first 16 games, and hit an anemic .183 on the seven-game road trip.

Jon Lester continues to be magnificent in April, as last night he allowed just 1 run over 8 innings. He retired the first 16 batters before giving up three hits and a 1-0 lead. (Which had been provided by Xander Bogaerts, who homered in the top of the sixth, the Red Sox first hit of the contest.) David Ross doubled in one run in the ninth, and Jonathan Herrera's bunt single with the bases loaded added on some insurance.

Koji Uehara returned after his short sabbatical with a stiff shoulder to get the save, allowing just a single in an uneventful ninth.

The pitching has kept the club afloat with this 7-9 start. Only one of the nine losses has been of the "blowout" variety (the 10-7 loss to Texas, which wasn't that close, as the Sox scored three in the ninth to make it cosmetically close), so there is cause for optimism.

There's just too much talent on this team to see them struggle this badly all season. They will also get Shane Victorino and Will Middlebrooks back shortly. They have also been playing mostly in colder weather, so the warmer temperatures should benefit the strugglers.

They return home to face Baltimore in a four-game series tonight that will conclude with the Patriot's Day game on Monday morning.

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