Nick Pivetta is living the life of an ace. That is a fact. This was aces do.
After going eight innings, allowing one run, in the Red Sox' 6-1 win over the A's Tuesday night, Pivetta ERA now stands at 3.50. In his last eight starts, the Sox' righty is 6-1 with a 1.83 ERA and opponent's batting average of .162.
But what might be as important as any of those numbers is the fact that Pivetta has thrown six or more innings in seven of the aforementioned appearances.
Since May 7, there is just one pitcher in baseball - Miami's Sandy Alcantara - who has pitched more innings than the 54 turned in by Pivetta.
"What, like one single thing? No. I think it’s a lot of things," said Pivetta when asked about the key to his current run, having just led the Red Sox to their 10th win in the last 12 games. "But a few really key things that I’ve been able to do and people have been able to help me out to get to where I am. Like I said, I think it’s really important that I’m able to focus on the next start rather than fixing something that happened in the last start.”
The production is important, no doubt. But the benefits that come with such a presence has always been invaluable to the Red Sox, as well.
In other words, as the Sox have tried to decipher which relievers might be reliable when it counts the most, Pivetta has afforded the bullpen the opportunity to not get too uncomfortable during its maturation process.
In Pivetta's last seven starts, the Red Sox have been forced to use as many as three relievers just once, with the relief pitchers over that span allowing just two runs in 14 innings.
Since Pivetta kicked off this eight-start run, the Red Sox carry the fourth-best bullpen ERA (3.04) in baseball, allowing just 26.8 percent of its inherited runners to score (8th-best in MLB over that time).
It's safe to say that the Red Sox have officially won that trade that acquired Pivetta and Connor Seabold from the Phillies for Brandon Workman and Heath Hembree. The best-case scenario has become better than anyone could imagined.
"We faced him at one point in 2019 if I'm not mistaken and his stuff was really good," remembered Red Sox manager Alex Cora. "I don’t know if it’s change of scenery or if it’s just him growing up. Maybe he’d be pitching this way in Philly right now. Sometimes you have to be patient. The organization pulled the trigger. They saw potential right? At that point, the Phillies needed some relievers and it happened. This guy is really good. He keeps learning and understanding that he has to work. I was watching (James Paxton's) bullpen and just happened that he was throwing his the other day and the way he goes about it was impressive. He tries to be perfect, he keeps working on his mechanics, his release points, his slider. So to get a pitcher like this, it was a good one. It was a good trade."
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