Sox play the humble way
Little things lead to big results
The Red Sox refer to them as “humble at-bats.”
By taking small swings and using the whole field, particularly in disadvantage counts, the Red Sox have found a way to drive in 30 runs with two outs this postseason, most by any team in a single postseason since the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals, who won the World Series by driving in 34 runs with two outs.
By thinking small, the Red Sox have found big results.
“Let’s win a pitch and put something quality together,” hitting coach Tim Hyers preaches. “I just think that snowballs, puts a lot of pressure on the opposing pitcher. They have to burn a lot of energy to make quality pitches, one after the other. One after the other can beat up the opposing pitchers.
“We have a plan for each one, and each pitch, try to win each pitch, not get ahead of ourselves. I think a lot of clubs get ahead of themselves and start thinking beyond that one pitch. Win it and go to the next.”
The record for two-out RBI is 45 by the 2004 Red Sox. The 2007 Red Sox had 34 two-out RBI.
Five of the Sox’ runs in their 8-4 win over the Dodgers in Game 1 on Tuesday night came with two outs.
Eduardo Nunez faced a two-out situation when he golfed Alex Wood’s breaking ball near his ankles over the Green Monster for a threerun shot in the seventh inning.
It wasn’t a big swing, but Nunez was guessing breaking ball in that at-bat and he got one.
“You know, that’s weird because I don’t care about being a hero,” Nunez said. “As long as we have the win, that’s all that matters. We are here to win and lose together. Who cares who’s the hero that night. As long as we have a hero, that’s a good feeling because we have the win.”
And the Sox scored two runs in the fifth inning when Xander Bogaerts beat out a double play ball to score one, and Rafael Devers hit a two-out single to drive in another.
“That’s a game changer,” said starter Chris Sale. “When you have guys like that doing that for you, you go out and do whatever you can for them.”
It’s become cliche, but the Red Sox’ trust in one another has allowed them to avoid trying to do too much at the plate, which is how several hitters got into slumps during the regular season.
“Just get on base, whatever it is,” said Mookie Betts. “Get on base and score one and if we put one on the board first it seems to work well for us so that’s kind of the goal.”
Said J.D. Martinez: “This lineup is so special because there are so many ways we can beat you. It can be a home run, it can be a stolen base, it could be singles, doubles. there’s just so many different ways where this lineup can win and I think that’s our game.”
Ron Roenicke has been coaching in baseball in some capacity since 1992, but the Red Sox bench coach said this group is unique in their ability to knock out other teams by doing the little things.
“I think it’s just the wellroundedness of the team,” he said. “We can score runs in a lot of different ways. We have a team that can run when we need to, and we can expose a lot. We have two guys that do a great job giving us information on different pitchers and it helps our running game, and it helps everything else too.
“You don’t want to strictly go by numbers, I know some teams are doing that. But I think the numbers are huge in what we try to do. Instead of, as a manager you’re guessing this is what you’re doing, now you have numbers that say yeah, it’s backing up what I want to do.”
The Red Sox have won eight games this postseason despite getting poor performances from their starting pitcher in five of them.
They’ve done it one stolen base, one single, one walk at a time.
Or as they call it, the humble way.
“A lot of those big moments come from little moments, little things that happen,” Brock Holt said. “Whether you work a walk, whether a guy gets a tough at-bat, whether he gets out or not but sees a lot of pitches, fouls some pitches off, puts balls in play. Steve Pearce running down the line on that double play ball. We were able to get an extra run on that from J.D.’s double.
“It’s just stuff like that, small stuff.”