BOSTON – (Staff and Wire Service Report) – It is not about how you start, right? The Boston Red Sox are hoping that is the case for the first month of the long and winding Major League Baseball season.
Following Wednesday’s series-closing win at the Minnesota Twins, Boston kicks off a challenging seven-game homestand against the surging Detroit Tigers on Friday night. The four-game set extends through Monday’s traditional 11:05 a.m. start on the Patriots’ Day holiday in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
“We’re (three) weeks into the season, and we feel like we haven’t played anywhere close to our best baseball. And it could be way worse,” shortstop Trevor Story said. “Once we get rolling and once we get to doing the things that we know we can do on a consistent basis, we’re excited about that.”
The Red Sox were on the verge of being swept in Minnesota, falling down 1-0 in the first inning before scoring the next nine runs on the way to the 9-5 victory. Story hit a three-run home run and drove in five, while Andruw Monasterio went 3-for-5.
Connelly Early backed it all up with six innings of one-run pitching, and now Boston will turn the ball to left-hander Ranger Suarez (1-1, 5.02 ERA) for Friday’s start.
Suarez looks to build off his best performance in a Red Sox uniform last Saturday at St. Louis, as he allowed just three hits and struck out six while shutting out the Cardinals through six innings.
“He moved the ball around,” Boston manager Alex Cora said. “It seems like his arm was a lot quicker than the first two (starts). It tells me he feels better.”
Suarez made starts for the Philadelphia Phillies against Detroit in each of the last two seasons. He went 0-1 with a 3.46 ERA across a combined 13 innings.
Meanwhile, Detroit hopes to bottle up its recent success as winners of six straight games, including a 10-9 comeback victory over the visiting Kansas City Royals on Thursday. An up-and-down season has seen the Tigers go from 4-4 to 4-9 and back above the .500 mark to 10-9.
Riley Greene’s two-out, two-run double tied the score and Colt Keith’s walk-off single capped a three-run rally in the ninth inning to seal their third straight one-run win.
“Part of our DNA is our willingness to do anything, but the other part that comes with that is we’re going to play ‘til the end. We’ve had to do that,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said. “These are funky wins with one run, or coming up late. … Our guys play all 27 outs.”
The Tigers, who banged out a season-high 14 hits, held a 6-1 lead after five innings before the Royals posted a six-run seventh. The game also included nearly two hours of rain delays.
Dillon Dingler hit a two-run homer — his team-leading fourth of the season — in the fifth, while Greene’s heroic swing capped a 3-for-4 day.
“We’re being clutch on both sides, with our pitching and hitting, but we’re playing really clean, good baseball right now,” Keith said. “We’re showing it on the scorecard. We’re winning.”
Like Suarez, Detroit starter Casey Mize (1-1, 3.94) is also coming off his first win of the season after throwing 5 2/3 innings of one-run ball to beat the Miami Marlins last Saturday. He struck out five.
Mize is 0-1 with a 3.95 ERA in five career starts against the Red Sox. He struck out eight in a 6 1/3-inning road no-decision on Sept. 26 of last season.
Detroit has won the last two season series.
–Field Level Media