CLEVELAND - Tuesday night's game at Progressive Field looked to be heading toward a Cleveland Guardians 2-1 victory over the Boston Red Sox.
Then came the top of the 8th inning.
Cleveland relievers Enyel De Los Santos and Nick Sandlin combined to allow four runs and retire just one batter as the Red Sox rallied for a 5-4 victory. The one-run loss was the 17th for the Guardians this year, out of 29 such contests (8th-most in MLB history through the first 60 games of a season).
De Los Santos, one of the Guardians' brighter spots out of the bullpen so far this season, failed to retire a hitter while allowing one run on a pair of hits (Justin Turner double, Triston Casas single) and a pair of walks on just 17 pitches - seven of them thrown for strikes. Sandlin then entered the game, allowing two runs on back-to-back singles to Rob Refsnyder and Emmanuel Valdéz before striking out Connor Wong. De Los Santos (2-1) would be charged with all four earned runs and the loss, while James Karinchak managed the final two putouts of the frame.
"The 'righties' got the hits off the 'righties'," said Guardians manager Terry Francona after the game. "It's not the way we drew it up."
When asked about De Los Santos' struggles, Francona commented: "He just didn't command. The ball wasn't going where he wanted it to tonight."
The Guardians (27-33) used left-hander Sam Hentges (1.1 scoreless innings) to clean up the top of the fifth and sixth innings in relief of starter Shane Bieber before setting up their bullpen options against the meat of Boston's lineup. Cleveland's ace scattered five hits and one walk over 5.2 innings while striking out a pair - the 11th time in 13 starts this year that Bieber has recorded four or fewer strikeouts.
"Guess I bounced back all right," Bieber lamented after the game. "[I] Could have, and should have, been better. It is what it is, but I was looking forward to tonight for the last five days."
Bieber managed a more individually successful outing than his May 31 start in Baltimore, where, despite the Guardians rallying for a 12-8 win, he allowed seven earned runs in a four-inning effort.
Bieber worked with the lead for almost all of his Tuesday start, as the Guardians posted a pair of runs off Red Sox lefty James Paxton in the bottom of the first inning, via back-to-back RBI doubles by Josh Naylor and Josh Bell. The Red Sox (31-30) would scratch a run back in the top of the fifth inning when Bieber allowed an RBI single to Kiké Hernández, allowing Masataka Yoshida to score from second base. Three at-bats prior to Hernández's hit, Bieber fielded a ground ball and tried to put out Yoshida on a fielder's choice, but would fail to do so.
"It was a bad decision," said Bieber. "I try to hang my hat on good decisions, but that's not one of them. [I] Would like that back. It ended up costing myself, and costing my team, a run there."
Paxton (2-1), meanwhile, settled down to strike out nine Guardians batters and go scoreless for the last six frames of his 7-inning outing.
"He's got really good stuff," Francona said about Paxton. "We came out of the shoot, got a couple [runs], and he kind of locked it in."
One Guardians hitter who managed multiple hits off Paxton and the rest of the Boston pitching effort was Will Brennan, who followed his Saturday night heroics in Minnesota with a 3-for-4 effort at the plate, including a pair of doubles that extended the young left-hander's hitting streak to seven games. Brennan cited "opportunity" and "being patient at the plate" as factors for his recent offensive success.
"That combination, and being able to swing at good pitches and put the barrel on the ball...Usually, good things happen after that," Brennan added.
One of Brennan's two-baggers came in the bottom of the eighth inning, with Cleveland down 5-3. After Red Sox reliever Chris Martin allowed an RBI single to pinch-hitting Amed Rosario (who returned to play after missing Sunday's game due to a knee injury), Brennan smacked a pitch to the right-center field gap to bring the Guardians to within a run.
Martin and the Sox would escape the inning, however, and clinch the win in the 9th, as Kenley Jansen retired the Guardians in order to pick up his 13th save of the season.
Wednesday will see the two squads return to action for a 7:10 p.m. first pitch. Tanner Bibee (1-1, 3.20 ERA) is expected to face Boston right-hander Kutter Crawford (1-2, 3.48 ERA).
