Red Sox right-hander Nathan Eovaldi bounced back in a big way Wednesday night, and it was among the key factors in Boston's 20-8 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays.
It came after Eovaldi took responsibility for what he called an "unacceptable" performance against the Toronto Blue Jays in his previous start. Eovaldi allowed a season-high seven earned runs in one of Boston's hard-to-swallow defeats during the past week.
He quickly proved Wednesday would not be the same and responded as a veteran ace tends to do.
"It's a game of small adjustments," Eovaldi said on a postgame video conference. "It's pitch-to-pitch, it's inning-to-inning, it's game-to-game. You got to stay on your craft. There’s always something to improve on. The two (starts) before this one, they didn’t go the way I liked it. I knew there were a lot of things I needed to focus on.
"Tonight, I stayed on all my pitches and had a good outcome."
It was just the second time in the last six starts that Eovaldi pitched seven or more innings. It was the fifth time this season Eovaldi pitched seven or more innings.
"I had a lot better command," Eovaldi said. "My splitter felt really good tonight, curveball felt really good. We were mixing it up, used the cutter towards the end a lot more. Like I said, when we're attacking the zone good things happen."
Eovaldi limited the Rays to just one run on three hits in seven innings. He struck out 10 batters, six of which came against the first 10 batters he faced. He allowed just one batter to reach base during the first four innings and finished throwing 69 of his 97 pitches for strikes.
His performance on the mound was mirrored by an equally dominant night in the batter's box for the Red Sox. Boston scored a season-high 20 runs on 19 hits as nine batters recorded at least one.
"It's a great win for us. It was a big one for us," Eovaldi said. "They're in first place right now, we're coming after them, and tonight is a big win for us. We got to come out tomorrow with the same mentality, go out there and attack and do what we did tonight."
The Red Sox will look for a series win Thursday against the Rays. You can watch the game live on NESN as first pitch is set for 4:10 p.m. ET.
