BOSTON — David Ortiz walked only once in his first 89 plate appearances against left-handers this season. So naturally, his free pass off southpaw Tony Sipp came back to bite the Houston Astros.
Sipp walked Ortiz with one out in the seventh inning Sunday. It capped a lengthy, 11-pitch battle. Hanley Ramirez took advantage of the walk moments later by hitting a go-ahead, two-run homer into the Green Monster seats at Fenway Park to propel the Red Sox to a 5-4 win and send Sipp into a world of regret.
“That was the last thing I wanted to do, was walk him,” Sipp told reporters after the game. “He’s not hitting the best right now, so I wanted to at least make him put it in play. If he’s swinging the bat well, then it’s not a bad thing to do, to walk him. But right now, he’s not the same Big Papi.”
Sipp is right. While Ortiz has swung the bat better of late, he’s in the midst of a down season. The lefty could ill-afford to walk the 39-year-old with the Astros leading by a run, especially with the right-handed-hitting Ramirez waiting on deck.
But Ortiz, to his credit, wouldn’t give in. The slugger, who fell behind in the count 1-2 after just three pitches, fouled off six offerings during the at-bat before laying off a slider down and out of the zone.
“I was just trying to go right at him, do anything but walk him,” Sipp said. “I got the 1-2 slider and it started backing up on me. I couldn’t get the one that was sharp that looked like a strike and then faded out of the strike zone. That’s why he kept fouling off and he was a little disappointed because he was missing some of my mistakes.”
Red Sox manager John Farrell pointed to Ortiz’s at-bat as a key moment in Sunday’s win, as it perhaps took a little something out of Sipp before the hurler’s pivotal showdown with Ramirez. Sipp actually recorded two strikes against Ramirez, too, but he again couldn’t finish the job.
“I felt like I was throwing the ball well,” Sipp said. “I got ahead of both Big Papi and Hanley, but I just couldn’t put them away.”
Ortiz’s second walk against a lefty this season was big. Just like Boston’s win, which came at the expense of Houston’s usually reliable bullpen.
Thumbnail photo via Winslow Townson/USA TODAY Sports Images
