Time for Sale’s pitch
Every five days, ace delivers with success
MIAMI — The theme to the first five games of the Red Sox season was how spectacular the starters were in their first complete turn through the rotation.
They went 4-0 with a 0.90 ERA in that run, their best mark in 99 years.
Based on how Chris Sale began Round 2 last night, the Red Sox remain in spectacular shape.
In his five innings, Sale allowed just one run on five Marlins hits, striking out six and walking zero. He may not have been in Marvel super-hero form, but he very much resembled the same ace who has been in place for nearly all of his Red Sox career, which now extends to one full season plus two starts.
In Game 1 of the season, Sale had established the tone of starting dominance when he went six scoreless innings against the Rays only to have the bullpen cough up the game.
Rather than face the Marlins’ lineup for the third time last night, Sale was lifted at the top of the sixth by manager Alex Cora and replaced by lefthander Bobby Poyner. Sale had thrown 93 pitches, 62 for strikes.
Last week in St. Petersburg, Fla., Sale left when the Red Sox had a 4-0 lead.
But thanks to an equally strong start last night by Miami’s Jose Urena, the Red Sox were tied at 1-1 when Poyner entered the game.
The Red Sox scored their run early off Urena, with J.D. Martinez singling in a run in the first inning. That lead held until the fourth, when Sale gave up a two-out RBI double to Justin Bour, who reached out on a 2-2 breaking ball low and away and poked it into right field, where Martinez dove but could not come up with the ball.
Had Mookie Betts been in right field, the ball likely would have been caught but Betts had the night off and Sale was the victim.
Other than that fourth inning, in which Sale allowed three hits, he was pretty much in control even if he allowed some two-strike counts to extend longer than expected against a Miami lineup that cannot be labeled “formidable” unless using TripleA franchises by comparison.
Sale began the game with two quick outs before Starlin Castro fought off a 2-2 count for six more pitches before he finally singled.
Sale finished the frame with a called strike three of Brian Anderson.
In the second and third innings, Sale faced the minimum.
Bour led off the second with a flyout before Cameron Maybin singled when Sale left a fastball in the middle of the plate. Maybin was off and running on a full-count pitch to Miguel Rojas, but the runner forgot to check the ball. Rojas lofted a fly to right field and Maybin had his eye on second baseman Eduardo Nunez, who performed an Oscar-worthy deke as if he was going to get a throw from catcher Christian Vazquez. Maybin went into a full dive. When he popped up from the base, he noticed Nunez did not have the ball and that it had just settled into the glove of Martinez, who doubled up Maybin at first.
The third inning was Sale’s easiest, as he toyed with the Nos.8 and 9 batters, Chad Wallach and Urena before striking out leadoff hitter Lewis Brinson on just three pitches.
Sale came out for the fifth and faced little resistance against the bottom third of the lineup.
The last time Sale pitched here, the game didn’t count — but that hardly mattered. Sale started the 2017 All-Star Game for the American League on July 11 and went two innings, striking out two and allowing three hits, all singles.
For no known reason, Sale has had a thing, not the good kind, about pitching against NL East teams. In his five prior starts against them, he had a 0-4 record, 6.54 ERA and .273 batting average against. Contrast that with his 12 starts against the other NL clubs, when he’s gone 6-1 with a 1.54 ERA and a .174 batting average against.
His only other career start against the Marlins came two years ago when he was with the White Sox. He allowed five runs on eight hits with seven strikeouts and a walk over 62⁄3 innings in a loss.
With a bat, Sale has yet to demonstrate he has reached threat level. Coming in he was 3-for-23 (.130) with a double and sacrifice bunt and he went 0-for-2 last night, striking out each time.