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Red Sox’ Sonny Gray, putting IL stint further behind him, shines in two-hitter
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- Red Sox’ Sonny Gray, putting IL stint further behind him, shines in two-hitter
BOSTON — There’s been so much focus on the Red Sox’ anemic offense of late that the team’s mostly high-quality pitching has gone almost unnoticed.
After all, when a team loses low-scoring games like the Red Sox have of late, it’s easier to pay attention to what they failed to do (hit) rather than what they did (pitch).
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On Wednesday night at Fenway, however, the Red Sox shone on both sides of the ball. And no one was more effective than starter Sonny Gray .
Making his second start since finishing up an IL stint , Gray limited the Philadelphia Phillies to a single run over six innings, leading to a 3-1 Red Sox victory.
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Gray fanned a season-high six and walked only one, and retired 17 of the 20 hitters he faced. The lone mistake came when Justin Crawford connected for a solo homer in the third.
“He was awesome, awesome,” gushed interim manager Chad Tracy. “Threw strikes, pounded the zone, looked a lot like the last one (in Detroit ) and got an inning further while only throwing eight or nine more pitches than he did last time. So he was really, really good.”
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“I felt better from pitch No. 1 today than I did in Detroit,” offered Gray, who improved to 4-1. “The start in Detroit, it had been a while. So I felt better from the first pitch than I did in my last start.”
Gray had made it a project to get more swing and miss Wednesday night after striking out just two in his last outing, and succeeded, averaging a strikeout per inning.
“I felt like I left three (strikeouts) out there,” said Gray, “but to have one per inning, at least, at the minimum, feels more normal. It’s something I’ve been digging into a little bit, because I strike people out and I haven’t been. I was trying to find a ‘Why’ for that and I think I’m getting closer to that.”
Gray and the trio of relievers that followed him were aided by some stellar glove work in the infield. In the fifth, first baseman Willson Contreras made a diving stop of a ball behind the first base bag, then won a footrace to retire Crawford for the final out of the inning.
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Two innings later, Trevor Story ranged far into the hole to backhand a ball hit by J.T. Realmuto , then made a strong jump-throw to first for the first out in the eighth.
“(The defense) has been great,” said Gray. “You feel very confident with the guys we have behind us. They’re elite. Honestly, I feel like we’re elite at every position on defense and that’s very comforting.”
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