ALDS Game 1: Sometimes You Just Lose A Baseball Game

Thoughts on the Red Sox game one loss, Eduardo Rodriguez, Rafael Devers, hitting, defense, Alex Cora, the whole shebang, really

Sometimes you just lose a baseball game. That’s what happened to the Boston Red Sox last night in Game One of the ALDS in Tampa, Florida. They got beat. 5-0. It felt like 100-0. It’s unfortunate that the loss happened to be the first game of a five game series, but it did. A loss isn’t a great way to start a series, but the Red Sox have come back and won series they’ve started with losses before. It’s not over yet.

There’s lots to discuss, and I’ll get into it in a second, but first, if you’ve been reading along at Sox Outsider but you haven’t yet subscribed, please subscribe! It’s free and it’s about the Red Sox and it’s by me, Matt Kory, ex of The Athletic, FanGraphs, and other places. Thanks for reading and subscribing.

I’ll let you behind the curtain a bit here. I don’t want to relive this game. It really sucked. So I’m not going to write 1,500 words about it. There’s another game today anyway, and hopefully that one will go better. It better go better because this one was a huge dud.

As is typical for a dud, it was in fine dud form right from the beginning. Eduardo Rodriguez got the start but manager Alex Cora pulled him two outs and two runs allowed into the second inning. It could’ve been a ploy to get right handers to face a Rays lineup designed to face lefty Rodriguez. It could’ve been because Rodriguez didn’t have his best stuff. It could’ve been the plan all along or it could’ve been that Cora didn’t like what he’d seen from his starter and decided to pull the plug before things got ugly. Either way, Rodriguez only threw 41 pitches, which could put him in line for some work later in the series out of the bullpen, perhaps in Game Three on Sunday.

The Rays didn’t exactly tee off on Rodriguez. Yes, Wander Franco crushed a double into right center. You can’t see me but I’m wearing my shocked face. You see, Wander Franco is really good. I’m counting down the days the Rays trade him to St. Louis for six prospects, probably some time in 2026. Anyway, the double scored Randy Arozarena who had walked to lead off the inning. The Rays second run scored on a swinging bunt. After that Tampa managed three runs, two on solo homers (one a cheapie Tropicana Field catwalk special) and one on an Arozarena steal of home which was exciting if you like watching your favorite team get humiliated.

A quick digression: I guess I’m in the minority on this. I saw a few people say that’s the play that sunk the Red Sox. No, the game was 4-0 at the time and the Red Sox had six outs left to give before losing. Also, you may have noticed the Red Sox didn’t score any runs all game. It was a great play by Arozarena, a lousy play by the Red Sox, and an utterly inconsequential play in the scope of the game.

The point a paragraph ago before I got sidetracked was that the Rays didn’t exactly kill Red Sox pitching. Eduardo wasn’t good but he wasn’t awful either. The Red Sox bullpen did their jobs just fine. Three runs allowed up against one of the best offenses in baseball over 6.1 innings isn’t great but it’s okay. Hardly a disaster.

The disaster was the Red Sox hitting. If you’d watched the Wild Card game and thought the Boston batters had turned the proverbial corner, nope. The Sox did hit the ball pretty hard a few times and they got a bunch of hits. In fact, they out-hit Tampa. The huge difference was the Rays walked four times in eight innings compared to zero for Red Sox hitters, and the Rays had four extra base hits, while the Red Sox had [say it with me now…] zero. Every Red Sox hit was a single.

The big story to me wasn’t the Arozarena steal of home or the Red Sox inability to hit generally speaking, but the Rays defense. More specifically their ability to always be in the perfect position to field the ball before it gets hit to them. Nine times the Red Sox made contact that resulted in exit velocities over 100 mph off their bats. The Red Sox were 4-for-9 in those at-bats with four singles and a ground-into-double-play. Partly that’s bad luck. Partly that’s good positioning. Partly that’s good pitching. It’s all parts of the Tampa defense playing their roles perfectly. And it’s annoying as heck.

Matthew Kory @mattymatty2000

The Rays have great defense but a big part of that is their positioning is insanely good. Must be very frustrating to play against.

That’s a tough thing to overcome if you’re the Red Sox. There is a way to do it though, and that is, as I said in the Division Series Primer I published Wednesday, you have to have great individual performances. The Red Sox had none yesterday. All Boston pitchers were okay, none were great. No Boston hitter, save perhaps Kyle Schwarber, was great. You can throw Xander Bogaerts in there if you want, but I wouldn’t.

There weren’t enough chances created and there wasn’t anything that came of the chances that were created. The one that stands out to me was in the eighth inning. The Red Sox loaded the bases with one out on three singles. The next two hitters were Rafael Devers and Hunter Renfroe. Devers struck out swinging on four pitches. He swung and missed three of them, all four-seam fastballs, the last of which was at his shoulders. Devers had the platoon advantage and was facing a pitcher on the ropes. He had to do something with that plate appearance and he did nothing with it. That happens in baseball sometimes. But it was emblematic of the day for the Red Sox.

Oh, and then Hunter Renfroe popped out. Inning over, game over. Yuck.

The Sox get their second shot at Tampa today. Chris Sale will take the mound and hopefully he’s got more in him than he did in his last time out against Washington. Boston can still take control of this series with a win. Going back to Boston tied with two games at Fenway Park would be a pretty big win for the Red Sox. The alternative, going home down 0-2 would be… less so. That all rests on the tall shoulders of Chris Sale. Unless Cora pulls him in the second inning.