A happy Sunday for Boston, indeed. Sports fans in New England were lucky enough to witness not one, but two epic comebacks in one afternoon, as the Red Sox overtook the Reds to win 5-4, and Tom Brady – sorry, the Patriots – beat the Houston Texans 36-33.
I really wish I had the football knowledge to cover both Sox and Pats in this article (I’m getting there), because the game was epic and Brady is the absolute GOAT beast, but I’m going to stick to what I know. My baseball prowess would outshine any attempt I made to recap that Pats game; I simply wouldn’t do it justice. So to our Red Sox Nation readers, here we go…
After I tweeted out that the Sox should easily be able to defeat the Reds – yes, I’m cocky sometimes – the Reds proceeded to take an early lead. In my defense, the Red Sox were 7-1 on this road trip at the time of my tweet, had just picked up their 90th win of the season, are in first place, and the Reds are in fifth place in their division. I’m also trying to stay positive; shitting on my team for not deserving a playoff run won’t make matters any better. It seemed like an easy win, but this team does not like to make it easy on us or themselves.
With a shaky Doug Fister on the mound looking to recover his mojo after two horrible starts, the Reds took an early lead, scoring in the first to make it 1-0. Luckily for the Red Sox, the MLB’s resident child prodigy Rafael Devers hit his 10th homer of the season to tie it up 1-1 in the 5th.
Between the bottom of the 5th and 7th, the Reds scored three more times to make it 4-1. I began to think that I’d jinxed it, even though with this inconsistent team, I can’t really take the blame for an offense that’s slept through a good portion of the season.
Enter: Mookie Betts. Last year’s AL MVP runner-up smashed a 3-run double off Raisel Iglesias, driving in Vazquez, Bogaerts, and Ohio-native Benintendi. He tied the game 4-4 in the 8th before Devers again came up big, driving in Mookie with an RBI single to get that final run of the day.
So the Red Sox have now swept in back-to-back series, remain in first place, and the magic number drops down to three. Plus, the Yankees lost, which always makes our wins a little bit sweeter – okay, a lot. I’m still worried about the fact that a majority of the lineup went hitless; only Bogaerts, Betts, Devers, and Leon actually got a piece of the ball today. Of the 8 wins on this road trip, 4 of them required the Sox offense to overcome deficits of 3 or more runs. And Doug Fister has not been great at all this month, which is a problem since you know, we need starters who don’t give up a million runs. Even though he allowed 3 runs, Dougie did show improvement in today’s game, with 9 K’s over 5 1/3 innings. I have to assume the team learns something from every game, and a win is a win, no matter how nerve-wracking it is. Super proud of this team for managing to win in 9 innings again, too.
Postseason, here we come. *knocks on wood*
Sox Game By the Numbers:
– 6 straight wins
– 8-1 on this road trip
– Won 14 of their last 17
– Lead over Yankees extends to 5 games
– Season record improved to 91-64
– Magic Number: 3
