BUNCH OF ’PEN PALS
Sox have relievers to thank for leveling series even with ’Stros
In the end, David Price’s performance hardly mattered. It was the Red Sox bullpen that saved the night.
Matt Barnes, Ryan Brasier, Rick Porcello and Craig Kimbrel worked 41⁄3 innings of one-run ball as the Sox captured a crucial 7-5 win over the Houston Astros in Game 2 of the American League Championship Series last night.
The best-of-seven series is now tied, 1-1, and moves to Houston for three games at Minute Maid Park starting tomorrow.
“The only time you notice a bullpen is when they blow it, right?” Astros manager A.J. Hinch said. “We don’t talk a lot about bullpens after games unless they’re incredibly dominant or give up runs.”
The Sox bullpen was mostly dominant last night.
Hinch said they have “good arms down there. It’s just a matter of them coming in executing. We just couldn’t find the hits until the ninth inning.”
Barnes and Brasier were phenomenal once again and appear to be the lockdown set-up guys the Red Sox were hoping for when they set their roles going into the postseason.
And Porcello pitched the eighth inning for the second time this postseason.
“They did an outstanding job,” manager Alex Cora said. “They’ve done it throughout the postseason. We trust those guys. There are certain matchups we like with them and we’re going to try to get those matchups. Barnes made some good pitches. Brasier was able to use his fastball. Porcello did it again. That was really impressive.”
They’ll be well-rested for tomorrow, but it’s going to be tough for the Sox to keep winning games like this.
Kimbrel needs to find his curveball. And the starting pitchers need to go deeper into games so the other starters don’t have to bail out the bullpen in the eighth inning every night.
Barnes took over for Price to clean up a mess in the fifth inning and pitched a scoreless sixth as well. His fastball is powerful and his curveball has looked sharp, despite Barnes missing three weeks in September due to hip inflammation.
In the postseason, Barnes has thrown 42⁄3 scoreless innings, allowing only three walks and no hits.
Brasier has been just as good with his fastball-slider combination. He handled the seventh in this one and pushed his scoreless inning total to 41⁄3 in the playoffs, having allowed just four walks and one hit.
With Porcello throwing a dominant eighth, the Sox have now used a starting pitcher in the eighth in three of their four postseason wins this year.
Using a starter in the eighth has been Cora’s not-so-secret weapon, and the move continues to fire up the Sox crowd at Fenway, who are loving Porcello’s animated and powerful outings out of relief.
“He’s got kind of the ‘it’ factor to come in and try to soak up the crowd and the atmosphere and the opportunity,” Hinch said.
But can the Red Sox keep doing this?
Chris Sale was hospitalized with a stomach illness last night after throwing with diminished velocity and command in his Game 1 start. It seems like a longshot he’d be used out of relief in Games 3, 4 or 5 if the Sox are going to bring him back on regular rest in Game 6.
Porcello should be the Game 4 starter, so he can’t come out of relief again until Game 6 at the earliest. And since Nathan Eovaldi will start Game 3, he’d be unavailable until Game 6 as well. So maybe Price can save the bullpen in Houston.
And whatever is going on with Kimbrel’s curveball, the Sox have to find an answer.
After struggling to throw his breaking pitch with any consistency in the ALDS, when he allowed three runs in 21⁄3 innings and nearly blew the decisive Game 4, Kimbrel gave up back-to-back hits to George Springer and Jose Altuve to give the Astros life with two outs in the ninth last night.
Altuve smoked one off the Green Monster to score Springer, and then Kimbrel went inside with a 99-mph heater to Alex Bregman. It was a sky-high fly ball similar to the one Gary Sanchez hit off Kimbrel in Game 4, and it fell just short of the Green Monster into Andrew Benintendi’s glove for the final out.
Kimbrel threw 16 pitches, just two curves, and one of them was a non-competitive pitch in the dirt. He’s now allowed runs in all three of his postseason appearances this year.
Cora has made it clear he isn’t going to turn away from Kimbrel, but they need to figure out what’s going on.
The bullpen has been good. They deserve credit for getting the Sox this far.
But with three games in a row coming up in Houston and Cora unable to go to his lockdown guys three days in a row, it’s only going to get more difficult from here.