So, that was a little crazy.
The Red Sox took a walk on the wild side, issuing eight walks to the Toronto Blue Jays on Saturday afternoon, but escaped by the skin of their teeth with a 7-6 win at Rogers Centre following a five-run rally in the ninth inning.
Brock Holt led off the ninth with his second double of the day, and Jackie Bradley Jr. tied the game two batters later with a monster home run to right field.
David Ortiz then picked a nice time to gather his first hit of the day a few batters later, sending an RBI single to left field to score Dustin Pedroia to take a 5-4 lead. Xander Bogaerts scored on a wild pitch and Rusney Castillo added an RBI single — his first hit of the day — to give the Red Sox a 7-4 lead.
Robbie Ross Jr. issued a two-out walk to Josh Donaldson in the bottom of the ninth, and Jose Bautista made him pay with a two-run home run absolutely crushed to center field. But Ross and the Red Sox held on for the victory.
GAME IN A WORD
Jaywalk.
Wade Miley walked five Blue Jays (get it?), a season high. It finally came back to bite him in the sixth inning, when Edwin Encarnacion blasted a two-run homer to left after a leadoff walk to Donaldson. At the time, it put Toronto ahead 2-1.
Noe Ramirez also walked the first two batters he faced in the eighth inning — Donaldson and Bautista — both of whom came around to score the go-ahead (at the time) runs for the Jays.
Donaldson’s third walk of the game led to Ross’ problems in the ninth.
IT WAS OVER WHEN…
Ross recorded the final out on a groundout to Pedroia in the ninth.
Matt Hague doubled to deep center following Bautista’s blast, but that was all she wrote for Toronto.
ON THE BUMP
— Miley had a weird day. He actually was pretty good and his curveball was top-notch all day, but as previously mentioned, he walked a season-high five batters.
The left-hander retired nine consecutive batters in the early innings before breaking that streak with back-to-back free passes in the fourth inning.
He earned a no-decision, going 6 2/3 innings, allowing two earned runs on three hits, with five walks and seven strikeouts.
— Noe Ramirez closed out the seventh after Ben Revere reached on an infield single. Revere was caught stealing during Donaldson’s at-bat.
Ramirez walked Donaldson and Bautista to begin the bottom of the eighth before Encarnacion singled to left field, driving in Donaldson to give the Jays a 3-2 lead. Chris Colabello followed with an infield single to load the bases, and Ramirez was pulled in favor of Jean Machi.
— Machi immediately struck out Russell Martin, but Kevin Pillar singled on a bloop to right-center field, scoring Bautista to expand the Jays’ lead.
— Tommy Layne replaced Machi as Boston’s third pitcher of the inning. He finally escaped by getting Ryan Goins to ground into a 2-3 double play on his first pitch.
— Ross held on in the ninth to earn his third save of the season.
IN THE BATTER’S BOX
— Everyone who started recorded a hit for Boston.
— Xander Bogaerts entered Saturday with a .360 batting average (9-for-25) against Blue Jays starter R.A. Dickey, including three doubles. He’s faced Dickey more than any other pitcher in his brief career.
After striking out swinging on high knuckleballs in his first two at-bats, Bogaerts took the first pitch he saw in the top of the sixth out of the yard for his sixth home run of the season.
He added a base hit in the ninth, finishing 2-for-5 and raising his average to .321.
— Jackie Bradley Jr. broke up an 0-for-21 streak with an odd RBI double that tied the game at 2 in the seventh. After Brock Holt hit a ground-rule double, JBJ smoked a liner off Cliff Pennington’s glove at second, then hustled around first for the double in a heads-up play.
But after Holt doubled again in the top of the ninth, JBJ crushed a 2-2 fastball to right-center field to tie the game, 4-4. It was Bradley’s ninth homer of the season.
He finished the game 2-for-4 with three RBIs, bumping his average up to .269 in the process.
— As mentioned, Holt doubled again in the top of the ninth. He ended the inning with a pop out to center, finishing the day 2-for-5 with two runs.
— Dustin Pedroia hit a triple into the gap in the first inning, but was stranded there. He walked in the ninth and scored the go-ahead run in the win.
— Boston was 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position and stranded seven batters through the first eight innings. But the Sox went 3-for-5 with RISP in the ninth.
TWEET OF THE GAME
UP NEXT
Left-hander Rich Hill takes the mound for Boston after making history in his last start — his first in six years. He’ll face another southpaw in Blue Jays lefty Mark Buehrle. First pitch is scheduled for 1:07 p.m. ET at Rogers Centre.
Thumbnail photo via Nick Turchiaro/USA TODAY Sports Images
