BOSTON – (Staff and Wire Service Report) – Oft-injured Boston starting pitcher Chris Sale went to work in a major league game for the first time in more than two months and Triston Casas hit a three-run home run to help the Boston Red Sox stretch their winning streak to three games by beating the visiting Detroit Tigers 5-2 Friday night.
Casas put Boston in front 4-0 when he hit his 19th homer of the season in the fourth inning. It was the first home run Detroit’s Tarik Skubal has allowed this season.
Sale, who last appeared in a game June 1, retired the first 14 batters he faced. He spent more than two months on the injured list with shoulder inflammation, but was activated off the 60-day IL Friday night.
Sale allowed two runs on one hit, struck out seven and didn’t walk a batter in 4 2/3 innings. Kerry Carpenter‘s solo home run in the fifth is the only hit Sale allowed. It was Carpenter’s 13th home run of the season.
Sale threw 58 pitches, 42 of which were strikes.
Kyle Barraclough (1-0) collected the win for pitching 1 1/3 innings of scoreless relief. Chris Murphy didn’t allow a hit or a run in the final three innings to earn the first save of his career.
Skubal (2-2) was pulled with one out in the sixth after he gave up five runs (four earned) on seven hits. Skubal struck out three and walked two.
Boston took a 1-0 lead by scoring an unearned run in the first. Rob Refsnyder reached on a throwing error, took third on Rafael Devers’ single and scored on a fielder’s choice.
After Casas homered to make it 4-0, Detroit scored twice in the fifth. Carpenter’s home run put the Tigers on the scoreboard, and then Riley Greene’s single drove in Javier Baez to make it 4-2.
The Red Sox increased their lead to 5-2 when Connor Wong’s two-out single drove in Trevor Story in the sixth.
The loss ended Detroit’s three-game winning streak.
–Field Level Media