The Boston Red Sox Friday, May 21, 2021

* The Boston Globe

J.D. Martinez’s last-ups blast highlights rally of the Red Sox season, beating Jays

Peter Abraham

DUNEDIN, Fla. — J.D. Martinez was perhaps another choice word or two from being ejected in the seventh inning, when he argued with umpire Mark Wegner following a called third strike on a close pitch.

Martinez, who rarely bickers with the umps, returned to the dugout hoping he would get another chance.

It came in the ninth inning with the game on the line, and he belted a two-out, two-run homer to lift the Red Sox to an 8-7 victory against the Toronto Blue Jays.

Martinez didn’t miss his pitch, sending a hanging slider from Rafael Dolis deep into the Florida night. It was his 12th home run of the season and the 250th of his career.

“I was just trying to go up there and hit it hard,” Martinez said. “It was a big win.”

Martinez, who was released by the Astros in 2014, said he never imagined he’d hit 250 homers.

The first-place Sox (27-18) took two of three from the Blue Jays and have won five of seven overall. It was their 17th comeback victory.

Matt Barnes closed the Jays out for his 10th save in 11 chances. He struck out three, working around a two- out walk with an overpowering fastball as the Sox-centric crowd of 1,562 celebrated.

“What an amazing win. What a great game. What a big-league ‘W,’” manager Alex Cora said.

Dolis inherited a 7-5 lead. Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis started the inning with singles. Barnes immediately started throwing in the bullpen, knowing the game could change quickly in the small, wind- blown spring training ballpark where the Jays have been playing their home games.

A wild pitch moved them up and Dalbec scored when Alex Verdugo grounded to first base for the second out. Martinez took a low slider for a strike, then hammered the next to right center.

“Even on nights when he quote unquote struggles, he’s one at-bat away from changing the game,” Cora said.

It was the first Red Sox go-ahead home run with two outs in the ninth inning of a road game since Sept. 2, 2018, when Brandon Phillips hit his only home run with the club to beat the Atlanta Braves.

All eight runs by the Sox scored with two outs. Toronto pitchers had retired 10 in a row before the ninth.

Trailing 2-0, the Sox made two quick outs in the top of the second inning. Christian Vázquez was nearly the third, but he fouled off a two-strike pitch before dropping a single into right field. It was the first of seven consecutive hits, as the Sox scored five runs against Steven Matz.

After Vázquez singled, Hunter Renfroe singled to center. Dalbec then launched a curveball to right field that got caught in the wind, but hit the foul pole for a home run.

Chavis kept the inning going with a double to the gap in right. Kiké Hernández singled into left field, the ball deflecting off the glove of shortstop Marcus Semien just enough for Chavis to score. Singles by Verdugo and Martinez drove in Hernández.

Four of the seven hits in the inning came with two strikes.

But the Sox did not score again off Matz, who went six innings and threw only 45 more pitches. And Red Sox starter Nick Pivetta, who has been strong all season, could not hold the 5-2 lead.

Up 5-3, Pivetta walked Semien to start the fifth inning. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. singled with one out, chopping a single into right field against a shift as Semien took third.

Teoscar Hernández followed with a slowly hit ball to third base that popped out of Rafael Devers’ glove for an error and Semien scored. Cavan Biggio then grounded a single to center to drive in Guerrero with the tying run.

With Pivetta at 95 pitches, the Sox tried Hirokazu Sawamura in the sixth inning. He had not pitched in eight days, and it showed.

Danny Jansen ripped a low fastball to the gap in right. Renfroe misplayed the ball and Jansen ended up on third. Jonathan Davis followed with a single to left to give the Jays the lead.

With two outs and runners on first and second, Hernández hit a sharp grounder up the middle that Bogaerts dove to stop and flipped to second. But Chavis dropped the ball for another error, and it proved costly when Randal Grichuk singled to drive in Davis. That gave the Jays a 7-5 lead.

The Sox weren’t sharp on the mound or defensively. But they overcame it.

“It was a huge team win. It was massive,” Pivetta said.

‘Take three strikes if we have the lead’: Little expected when Red Sox pitchers grab the bats this weekend

Peter Abraham

DUNEDIN, Fla. — The Red Sox start a three-game interleague series at Philadelphia on Friday, which means they won’t have a designated hitter.

The three pitchers lined up to start — Martín Pérez, Nate Eovaldi, and Eduardo Rodriguez — dutifully took batting practice and went half speed through base-running drills the last few days.

“Absolutely awful,” manager Alex Cora said Thursday, followed by a little smile.

Cora’s hope is for a pitcher to get a bunt down if needed, but otherwise to avoid injury. Every manager’s fear is a muscle strain of some kind that leads to a stint on the injured list.

“Take three strikes if we have the lead and keep moving forward,” Cora said.

Baseball had a universal DH last season as a safety measure, with players having little time to prepare for a shortened season, but Major League Baseball and the Players Association couldn’t come to an agreement on making it permanent. It’s a subject that will be addressed again in the negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement.

At a time when the game needs more offense, pitchers were hitting .106 with a .281 OPS through Wednesday, with strikeouts in 47 percent of their plate appearances.

Cora, who came up as a player in the National League, is among the managers who would prefer the universal DH.

“I didn’t mind it last year, to be honest with you, as a baseball fan,” he said. “Going into these games, it’s difficult. Right now this is where we’re at . . . it will be good for baseball in general to have one more hitter.”

Perez is 1 for 23 in his career with 19 strikeouts, and Rodriguez 0 for 20 with 10 strikeouts. Eovaldi is Ted Williams by comparison, going 12 of 151 (.079) with two RBIs.

David Price is the last Red Sox pitcher to collect a hit, an RBI single off Arizona’s Luke Weaver on April 6, 2019.

Rodriguez has hit a few home runs in batting practice and fancies himself as quite a hitter, referencing long-ago softball exploits in Venezuela. Cora laughed when asked if he thought Rodriguez would collect that elusive first hit.

“Not at all. Nada. No confidence,” he said.

Cora does not allow players to wear earrings on the field, but granted an exception for Rodriguez to wear a dangling cross like Barry Bonds did during his career.

“I’m going to give him a chance to do that, to see if he can get a hit,” Cora said. “But the chances are very slim.”

Xander Bogaerts doesn’t like Rodriguez’s chances against Phillies starter Zach Wheeler, who has allowed only 7.0 hits per nine innings.

“It’s looking a little dark,” Bogaerts said. “He’s my boy and all; I would be really happy if he gets one. But I would also be really surprised.

“Wheeler’s a pretty good pitcher with a lot of velocity and Eddie’s bat speed is kind of not too fast. I would say he has a 1 percent chance, just because he has pop.

“Listen, man. If he swings at the right time, at the right moment, at the right pitch, he can hit it far. But he needs a lot of things to go in his favor.”

Bogaerts said he would “100 percent” be a better pitcher than Rodriguez is a hitter.

Starting back up

Triple A righthanders Tanner Houck and Connor Seabold have started post-injury throwing programs.

Houck hasn’t pitched since May 4 because of a flexor muscle strain. Seabold has yet to pitch this season because of elbow inflammation.

“They’re feeling good,” Cora said.

Houck has started two games for the Sox this season. Seabold has not appeared in a game since 2019, but the Sox believe he could be a depth option.

The Sox are getting more testing done on Triple A righthander Eduard Bazardo, who strained a lat muscle on Tuesday. He has pitched twice in the majors this season.

On the way?

Danny Santana was not in the Worcester lineup on Thursday and is likely to be promoted on Friday. The veteran utility man was signed to a minor league contract in March and played eight games in the minors after recovering from injuries. There are some moving parts to complete the transaction, as the Sox would need to open a spot on the 40-man roster as well . . . ESPN picked up the Sunday, June 6, game against the Yankees in the Bronx, which will move it from 1:05 p.m. to 7:08 p.m. . . . The Blue Jays host a four-game series with the Rays starting Friday before relocating to their Triple A stadium in Buffalo starting on June 1.

When Dave Dombrowski’s MLB expansion dream died, he found a new project: The Phillies

Alex Speier

Dave Dombrowski is enjoying a familiar vantage point in Philadelphia.

In 2020, for the first time in more than 40 years, Dombrowski wasn’t part of a major league front office. After the Red Sox fired him in September 2019 with just over a year left on the five-year contract he’d signed in 2015, he went to work with a group trying to bring a big-league team to Nashville.

But as much as the effort to secure and build an expansion team appealed to Dombrowski, MLB officials informed him in December that expansion wouldn’t be considered for at least another year. And so, Dombrowski — who’d declined previous chances to talk with the Phillies about their vacant head of baseball operations position — changed course.

So with titles with the Red Sox (2018) and Marlins (1997), as well as two World Series appearances with the Tigers (2006, 2012) on his résumé, he’s in Philadelphia, once again the architect of a team with grand ambitions.

“I always have loved what I do and enjoyed what I have done,” Dombrowski said by phone on Thursday. “It’s great to be back and involved in this on a daily basis.”

For the first time since his departure from Boston, Dombrowski will visit this weekend with his former team, one that still bears his partial imprint. The Red Sox are in first place thanks in no small measure to Xander Bogaerts (signed by Dombrowski to a six-year, $120 million extension in 2019), J.D. Martinez (five-year, $110 million deal before the 2018 season), and Nate Eovaldi (four-year, $68 million deal after the 2018 season).

But there will be others whose absence likewise reflects at least in part on Dombrowski. Chris Sale is rehabbing in Fort Myers from Tommy John surgery in the second year of a five-year, $145 million extension. The Red Sox are giving the Dodgers $16 million to cover part of David Price’s salary this year, the sixth year of the seven-year, $210 million contract to which Dombrowski signed him.

And, of course, there’s Mookie Betts, who was dealt to Los Angeles in part because of those other commitments — though it’s worth noting that Dombrowski may have delayed the star’s departure, once telling Red Sox principal (and Boston Globe) owner John Henry “they’ll burn down my house if we trade Mookie Betts.”

Meanwhile, the Red Sox roster has undergone massive change. Of the 26 active players on Thursday, just 11 were in the organization under Dombrowski.

“There’s been a lot of change, but that happens in the game. That’s not surprising,” said Dombrowski. “That was a decision that I kind of knew was coming. We had talked consistently about how we wouldn’t be able to retain all the players. With a club that good, you’re just in a position where as the expenses rose, you knew the time was going to come. I was prepared for it, but they decided to have somebody else deal with that. But [the turnover] was not shocking.

“But even though there’s a lot of change,” he added, “there are a lot of core players who are still there.”

So, too, is Alex Cora. The manager spoke Thursday about his sense of gratitude toward Dombrowski, both for the willingness to entrust a championship-caliber roster to a rookie manager and for the support Dombrowski offered during his departure from the Sox and year-long suspension in 2020 as a result of the 2017 Astros cheating scandal.

Cora said that Dombrowski called or texted weekly last year to check on him.

“I’m thrilled [for him]. He deserves to be back,” said Dombrowski. “We stay in close contact. Alex has become a good friend during this time period. We talked a lot last year and through the winter time process for him, and we continue to talk. He’s a tremendous baseball man and I think a tremendous big league manager, but also a really good person. I’m happy for him. The game is a better place when Alex Cora is involved in it from a managerial perspective.”

Cora felt similarly about Dombrowski.

“He’s where he needs to be, impacting a baseball organization,” said Cora. “I’m looking forward to seeing him.”

In Philadelphia, Dombrowski’s team is loaded with high-end talent. The lineup features stars Bryce Harper and J.T. Realmuto. The rotation has Aaron Nola, Zack Wheeler, and Zach Eflin, whose talent ranks with any rotation trio in baseball.

Yet they were just 22-21 entering Thursday, one game behind the Mets in the jumbled NL East.

“It’s a mixed situation. We’re only a game out of first place, which is good. [But] we’re only a game over .500,” said Dombrowski. “I think we have a talented enough club. . . . We’re right there. We’re in a position where if we play well, do some things that make us a little better internally as well as probably externally, we’ve got a chance to win.”

That, of course, is something that the Sox did with frequency under Dombrowski after he joined them in 2015. He inherited an incredible core of emerging young talent and successfully supplemented it with veterans, who helped push the group across the championship finish line with a 108-win season in 2018.

“He won,” said Cora. “He did it his way, too.”

But that way came with an expiration date. As the Sox slipped to 84-78 in 2019, the team’s owners decided they needed a leader who would strike more of a balance between the present and future. And so, Dombrowski was fired and replaced by Chaim Bloom.

Dombrowski is experienced enough to accept what transpired without letting it sour his experience with the Red Sox, or what the organization accomplished while he was there.

“It didn’t end the way I anticipated or thought it would, but there were a lot of great moments, and I think we would have continued to have a lot of great moments as time went on,” said Dombrowski. “But the time there was very good, with very good memories.”

* The Boston Herald

Red Sox beat Blue Jays on J.D. Martinez’s homer with two outs in the ninth

Jason Mastrodonato

The Red Sox were one out away from losing sole possession of the lead in the American League East when J.D. Martinez stepped to the plate.

With the tying run on third base and two outs in the ninth inning Thursday night, Martinez got a hanging slider from Blue Jays closer Rafael Dolis and hammered it over the right-field wall for a two-run homer, his 12th of the season.

It was enough to lead the Sox to an 8-7 win over the Jays, secure a series win and preserve their lead in the division.

“Obviously, my job is to hit and to drive in runs,” Martinez said. “Those situations, the team’s depending on me to go up there and put a good at-bat together and hit the ball hard. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. All I can control is my preparation and doing all the work and getting ready for that at-bat, really. The rest is up for chance, really.”

It had looked like the Red Sox were about to lose both of those after a sloppy game in which they made three errors, including a dropped catch at second base by Michael Chavis that almost cost them the game.

But Bobby Dalbec and Chavis started the ninth inning with back-to-back singles to get a rally going. They advanced 90 feet on a wild pitch. And after Kiké Hernandez struck out, Dalbec scored on a groundout by Alex Verdugo.

With Chavis at third base and two outs, Martinez came through in the clutch with a monster shot to right- center. Normally quite reserved, Martinez was seen screaming and pumping his fist as he rounded first base. It was also Martinez’s 250th career home run.

“It was a good feeling when he came up with a man at third,” manager Alex Cora said. “Usually in those situations, they expand the plate and make him chase pitches. But they did not, and he put great swing on it.”

Matt Barnes warmed up quickly and handled the bottom of the ninth as the Red Sox moved to 27-18 on the season.

They’re now a game up on the Tampa Bay Rays, who are 26-19. The Yankees are 25-19 and a half game back. The Jays fell to 23-19, 2 1/2 games back.

It was nearly the first time since April 8 the Red Sox weren’t alone atop the division until Martinez changed things in the ninth.

“That’s all we do; we show up, we play, we move on,” Cora said. “Now it’s on to Philly and it should be a fun series up there.”

The takeaways:

1. Nick Pivetta, who wasn’t particularly sharp in this one, put his team in a 2-0 hole after the first inning. Bo Bichette, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Randal Grichuk each doubled to put the Jays ahead.

With two outs in the top of the second, the Red Sox offense responded with seven straight hits.

Jays lefty Steven Matz had two strikes each on Christian Vazquez, who singled, Hunter Renfroe, who singled, and Dalbec, who smoked a three-run homer off the right-field foul pole.

The Sox finished with five runs in the inning while sending 11 batters to the plate as they took a 5-2 lead behind Pivetta.

2. But it was another sloppy night on defense for the Red Sox, who made three errors and now have an astounding 32 errors in 45 games. Only the Angels (35) have committed more.

Rafael Devers made his team-leading seventh error in a key spot in the fifth, when Teoscar Hernandez hit a bouncing ball down the third-base line with runners on the corners. Devers tried to field it while on the run toward home, but the ball went in and out of his glove as the run scored and everybody was safe.

Two runs scored in the inning to tie the game, 5-5.

Hirokazu Sawamura replaced Pivetta in the sixth and the Jays quickly went ahead, 6-5, on two straight hits to start the inning.

But Sawamura should’ve been out of the inning with just one run allowed had Chavis not made a bad error with two outs.

Hernandez hit a ball to shortstop, where Xander Bogaerts collected it and threw it to Chavis at second. It was a routine play, but Chavis dropped the ball. Bogaerts hit him in the glove and Chavis simply couldn’t squeeze it. Grichuk singled on the very next play as the Jays took a 7-5 lead that held until the ninth.

3. It was an ugly game defensively, but Pivetta wasn’t great from the mound, either. He allowed five runs (four earned) on seven hits and two walks over five innings. It was clearly his worst start of the year, and first time since April 11 that he allowed more than three runs in a game.

“It’s not easy (to pitch in Dunedin, Fla.),” Pivetta said. “Wind’s blowing out pretty hard. It doesn’t feel like a regular field to me personally, but I’ve still got to make pitches at the end of the day.

“I felt really good. I had a really good curveball going. I commanded my slider. I thought my fastball command was actually pretty good tonight. As a whole I felt really good, to be honest with you.”

Red Sox Notebook: Alex Cora credits Dave Dombrowski for doing it ‘his way’ to build the 2018 roster

Jason Mastrodonato

“Dealer Dave” Dombrowski will be reunited with Alex Cora on Friday, when the Red Sox travel to Philadelphia for a three-game set with the Phillies.

Dombrowski left his comfortable perch in Nashville, where he was part of a group of baseball enthusiasts trying to recruit an expansion team, to join the Phillies’ front office in December. He’s getting paid handsomely to do it, with USA Today reporting that he’ll receive $20 million over four years.

Dombrowski made some bold offseason moves, but the Phillies aren’t exactly in great shape.

They’ve been hovering around .500, largely because they lack starting pitching depth and have struggled to find decent replacements after a handful of position player injuries. With one of the worst farm systems in the game and less than $10 million of space under the luxury cap threshold, Dombrowski has some work to do.

Cora said he’s looking forward to seeing him.

“He gave me a chance to be a big-league manager,” Cora said. “He trusted me with a team that had a lot of expectations. People don’t understand how much pressure we had in 2018 going into that season. It was a team that made the playoffs a few years in a row, they didn’t advance, we added J.D. Martinez at that point and everybody felt like, ‘OK, here we go. It’s World Series or bust.’ ”

Dombrowski’s signing of Martinez to a five-year, $110 million deal will go down as one of the best moves he made with the Red Sox.

“It was a lot of pressure, but it was great,” Cora said. “A great learning experience for us to do that and give Dave another World Series and put him where he’s at in the world of baseball. It was amazing. We worked together well. It didn’t end up the way we wanted to or the way we planned, but things happened. Things happen for a reason.”

Dombrowski was let go during August of the ’19 season because of a difference in opinion on the future of the franchise with principal owner John Henry. Dombrowski clearly felt the Red Sox should keep the foot on the throttle and stick with a win-now attitude, while Henry wanted to take a more efficient but less exciting rebuilding approach.

When Cora was fired after MLB pinned most of the ’17 Astros’ cheating scandal on him, Dombrowski was “one of my biggest supporters,” Cora said.

“Once a week, he’d make sure to text me or give me a call and I appreciated that,” he said. “The conversations go from baseball to how the kids are doing. I appreciate that from Dave. I’m glad he’s back in baseball. He caught me off guard. I was surprised he accepted that job because he was very settled in Nashville, he loved what he was doing. But he’s where he needs to be, impacting a baseball organization and I’m looking forward to seeing him.”

Asked about Dombrowski’s legacy in Boston, Cora was direct.

“He won,” Cora said. “He won. He did it his way, too. You look at that team, 108 wins, 119 to win it all, people talk about, ‘Is it the greatest team in the history of the Red Sox?’ That’s up for people to debate, but for one year, nobody was better than us.”

Santana looks ready to contribute

Utility man Danny Santana will join the Red Sox in Philadelphia this weekend, according to a report by ESPN Deportes.

Cora said he couldn’t comment on the report, but Santana has gotten plenty of work during his time in the minors (.433 average, three doubles, three homers in eight games) and the Sox could use another position player on the roster, particularly in a National League park.

Last call for pitcher hitters

This year could be the last chance for pitchers to hit before the universal designated hitter is likely implemented for the 2022 season.

“It will be good for baseball in general to have one more hitter,” Cora said.

He said he doesn’t like having his pitchers hit, especially given the chance of injury, and will instruct his pitchers to take strike three if his team is ahead.

Cora also joked that starter Eduardo Rodriguez was unlikely to break his 0-for-20 career slump this weekend, but Cora will be breaking his rule of not allowing players to wear earrings so that Rodriguez can wear a dangling cross earring while he’s at the plate.

“It’s similar to Barry’s,” Cora said, referencing Barry Bonds’ famous earring. “I’m going to give him a chance to do that to see if he can get a hit, but the chances are very slim.”

Woo Sox announce promotions Baseball fans in Central Massachusetts will have a chance to buy June tickets to see the Triple-A Woo Sox starting Monday at 10 a.m.

The club is doing promotions at Polar Park for every home game during the season. Among them are “College Night” on Thursdays, when college students will get $15 tickets that include $9 of food and drink credit, Friday night fireworks, Saturday postgame catches on the field and the running of the bases every Sunday.

J.D. Martinez: ‘I would never have imagined that I would have hit 250 homers’

Jason Mastrodonato

Seven years and two months before hitting his 250th major league home run, J.D. Martinez was released.

Uncertain if he’d ever get another chance, Martinez packed his bags and left the Houston Astros organization as a .251 hitter with just 24 homers in almost 1,000 plate appearances.

Thursday night, after clubbing his 250th career homer with two outs in the ninth to save the Red Sox from a loss and propel them to an 8-7 win over the Blue Jays, Martinez took a moment to appreciate how far he’s come.

“It’s a blessing,” he said. “It’s a blessing from God. I would never have imagined that I would have hit 250 homers. If you had told me that 10 years ago — my career kind of took a roller coaster early on, but God guided me and he got me to here. I give thanks to him.”

Martinez was sad that his family wasn’t able to attend the game in Dunedin, Fla., about 300 miles from Miami, where he was born.

“I wish,” he said. “But it was during the week. They’ve gotta work.”

Since being released by the Astros on March 22, 2014, Martinez has hit .302 with a .940 OPS and 226 homers in more than 3,800 big league plate appearances, about one homer every 17 at-bats, a far cry from the average of one homer every 42 at-bats he had hit over parts of three seasons with his original franchise.

“J.D. is one of the best hitters in the game,” said Red Sox closer Matt Barnes. “His approach and ability to pull you to left field and hit a homer to right field — but it’s not surprising. The work he puts in off the field, the number of reps he takes and his recognition of his body and ability to make adjustments from at- bat or even pitch to pitch, it’s incredible. It’s not surprising at all. He’s an incredibly hard out.”

* The Providence Journal

This was no empty milestone for J.D. Martinez, Red Sox

Bill Koch

This was no empty milestone home run for J.D. Martinez.

That’s what the Red Sox hope, anyway. The best version of their 2021 season would make Thursday night’s result an important one.

Martinez struck a two-out shot to right-center in the top of the ninth inning at TD Ballpark. Boston stole a game it controlled and let slip at various points of the evening. This victory over the vagabond Blue Jays, 8- 7, came in a matchup between two clubs atop the American League East.

“That’s my job – to hit and to drive in runs,” Martinez said. “Those situations, the team is depending on me to go up there and put a good at-bat together and hit the ball hard.”

Martinez’s struggles through last season mirrored those of his team. His resurgence thus far has helped spark a different feeling in the Red Sox clubhouse. Their 17th come-from-behind win was clinched when Matt Barnes blew away Danny Jansen with a high fastball.

“What an amazing win,” Boston manager Alex Cora said. “What a great game. What a big-league W.”

Boston was down to three outs facing a 7-5 deficit when Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis opened with singles. An infield out from Alex Verdugo left the Red Sox one run short until Martinez latched onto a hanging slider out over the plate. Rafael Dolis melted under the pressure as Boston continues to surprise among the contenders.

“If we continue to win series we’re going to be really good this year,” Barnes said. “Tonight was an awesome one.”

Martinez managed just seven home runs and a .680 OPS in 54 games last year. Those numbers have swelled to a 1.013 OPS and 12 home runs in just 43 games through the middle of May. Boston couldn’t have asked for a better scenario to make amends for losing an early 5-2 lead.

“It’s a team we’re going to be battling against all year,” Martinez said. “To steal one like that is big for us. They’re on our heels in the standings.”

Barnes blew his first save of the season on Sunday when Shohei Ohtani cracked a two-run homer for the Angels at Fenway Park. How pumped up was the right-hander to get back on the correct side of the ledger? Barnes turned a few days of rest and better extension on his fastball into a 98.2-mph four-seamer past Jansen – only one of his 103 outs recorded on fastballs in the last two years came on a harder pitch.

“With this offense, if we’re down by two or three runs, that’s not a big deal,” Barnes said. “We’re five pitches away from tying a ballgame or taking a lead with the way these guys swing the bats.”

The Red Sox wiped out an early 2-0 deficit with seven straight two-out hits in the top of the second. Dalbec’s three-run homer off the foul pole in right and Kiké Hernandez’s RBI single to the left side made it 4-2. Martinez singled to left to give Boston a three-run cushion.

“We have a good offense,” Cora said. “These guys, although they’ve been struggling the first month, they’re capable hitters. When they go the other way it’s fun to watch.”

The Red Sox stalled there while Toronto chipped its way back against Nick Pivetta. The Blue Jays tied the game in the bottom of the fifth when Cavan Biggio chopped a single through the vacated left side. Toronto took the lead in the bottom of the sixth when Jonathan Davis and Randal Grichuk lined RBI singles to left and center, respectively.

“That’s a good ballclub they’ve got over there,” Barnes said. “That’s a good lineup. They’ve got some really good arms.”

Boston committed three errors and allowed just four earned runs. Hirokazu Sawamura was on the hook after a couple mistakes behind him in the sixth. Phillips Valdez claimed the win thanks to 1 1/3 scoreless frames and Barnes set a new career high with his 10th save.

“It’s incredible what these guys can do,” Pivetta said. “It’s what we’ve been doing. It’s what we’re capable of. It’s what’s going to keep happening.”

Are Red Sox fans ready to believe that yet? Martinez hit his 200th career home run in what turned out to be an empty 2019 season. Let’s just say he’s not planning on the same barely two years later.

Red Sox Journal: A reunion for the brass of 2018

Bill Koch

Alex Cora and Dave Dombrowski will reunite this weekend in Philadelphia.

The manager and president of baseball operations who led the Red Sox to their most recent World Series title in 2018 have traveled a winding road since that glorious October night in Los Angeles.

Cora has been suspended for a season by Major League Baseball and forced to leave his dream job in Boston. Dombrowski was fired 11 months later and worked on bringing an expansion club to Nashville before landing with the Phillies. The three-game series starting Friday night will bring them back together on the same field.

“Looking forward to seeing him,” Cora said. “He gave me a chance to be a big-league manager. He trusted me with a team that had a lot of expectations.”

The Red Sox won back-to-back American League East championships prior to firing John Farrell. Boston flamed out of the A.L. Division Series in consecutive seasons, going a combined 1-6. Dombrowski hired Cora, signed J.D. Martinez to a five-year contract in free agency and reloaded for what turned out to be a historic season.

“We worked together well,” Cora said. “It didn’t end up the way we wanted to or the way we planned, but things happen. Things happen for a reason.”

Cora spent the 2020 season at home in Puerto Rico, serving something of a personal exile. Dombrowski was dismissed in September 2019 after failing to secure a contract extension from the Red Sox. Dombrowski was entering the final year of his deal and Boston ownership — John Henry and Tom Werner, specifically — were discouraged with the return they received on some of the organization’s high-profile signings.

“He was one of my biggest supporters personally last year,” Cora said. “Once a week, he made sure to text me or give me a call. I appreciated that.

“The conversations go from baseball to how the kids were doing, and I appreciated that from Dave. I’m glad that he’s back in baseball.”

When asked what Dombrowski’s legacy with the club should be, Cora wasted no time providing an answer.

“He won,” Cora said. “And he did it his way, too.

“You look at that team — 108 wins, 119 to win it all. People talk about if it’s the greatest team in the history of the Red Sox.

“That’s up for people to debate. For one year, nobody was better than us.”

Hurlers practice hitting

Red Sox pitchers took batting practice on Wednesday ahead of their latest trips to the plate this weekend.

Martin Perez, Nathan Eovaldi and Eduardo Rodriguez will dig in against the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park. Rodriguez is the typical object of friendly ridicule from his manager and position players prior to such occasions. He’ll enter Sunday’s afternoon matchup 0-for-20 with nine strikeouts over the course of his career to date.

“Who is he facing? [Zack] Wheeler? Looking a little dark there, you know?” Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts said. “He’s my boy and all — I would be really happy if he gets one. I would also be really surprised.”

The limited schedule in 2020 carried with it use of the universal designated hitter. It’s an issue likely to come up during Collective Bargaining Agreement discussions after its expiration in December. Owners are likely to push against adopting the concept for a simple reason — it would require them to spend on an additional competent hitter for their respective rosters.

“Obviously, that’s going to be a big topic in the offseason,” Cora said. “I do believe it would be good for baseball in general to have one more hitter.”

Santana close to call-up

Danny Santana (right foot) could be at the end of his rehab assignment.

ESPN reported Santana would join Boston prior to the start of its weekend series. The veteran utility man was out of the lineup at Triple-A Worcester on Thursday night.

“I can’t comment about it,” Cora said. “He’s still in Worcester. I don’t think he’s in the lineup tonight but he’s working out down there.”

The switch-hitting Santana is 13-for-30 with three doubles and three home runs across eight games at Class-A Greenville and with the WooSox. He’s played left field twice, first base, second base and third base at Polar Park. Santana underwent Tommy John surgery in the offseason and had an infection in his foot cleared during spring training.

The Red Sox would be forced to make a 40-man roster move prior to adding Santana. Boston also would need to make a 26-man roster move. Cora discussed the option of going to a four-man bench and cutting down to 13 pitchers earlier this week.

Surge in sore arms

The Red Sox have injury concerns regarding several of their pitching prospects.

Tanner Houck (flexor soreness) and Connor Seabold (right elbow inflammation) have resumed their respective throwing programs. Houck was shut down after one start with Triple-A Worcester while Seabold was sent to Boston’s spring training home prior to the start of the WooSox season.

“They started their throwing progression,” Cora said. “They feel good.”

Eduard Bazardo (right lat strain) has been shut down after leaving his outing at Worcester on Tuesday. Bazardo threw just five pitches in the top of the ninth inning before signaling to the home dugout.

“He’s getting treatment,” Cora said. “Obviously, he’s going to get more testing. Right now, we shut him down.”

Thaddeus Ward is also reportedly dealing with a right forearm strain at Double-A Portland.

Sox-Yanks goes national

Boston and the Yankees will take a primetime spot for their June 6 matchup in the Bronx.

The Red Sox and New York have been flexed to ESPN Sunday Night Baseball. That meeting will cap the first series of the season between the old rivals.

Boston and the Yankees were originally scheduled to play at 1:05 p.m. The Red Sox will enjoy the following Monday off after a seven-game road swing through Houston and New York. Boston will take the field on 10 straight days beginning with next weekend’s home series against the Marlins.

Why so many no-hitters (6) in MLB? No easy answers

Bill Koch

New York Yankees pitcher Corey Kluber, without his hat, is congratulated by his teammates after throwing a no-hitter against the Texas Rangers on Wednesday, the sixth no-hitter in the major leagues this season. Major League Baseball is on pace to shatter its previous record for no-hitters thrown in a single season.

Corey Kluber did the honors for the Yankees on Wednesday in a 2-0 victory over the Rangers. The right- hander issued a lone walk and struck out nine at Globe Life Park.

Kluber’s gem came on the back of Spencer Turnbull making history for the Tigers against the Mariners. Turnbull issued just a pair of walks and fanned nine the previous night at T-Mobile Park as Detroit recorded a 5-0 win over Seattle.

The Rangers, Mariners and Cleveland have all been on the receiving end of a pair of gems. Seattle entered Thursday batting just .198 with a .639 OPS — both last in the big leagues. Offenses are on the defensive like they haven’t been since the famed Year of the Pitcher in 1968.

“Sometimes you go a long time without hearing about a no-hitter,” Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts said. “We’re approaching the end of May and we already have six of them.

“It’s a little funny. It’s a little weird. I don’t have any answers as to why.”

Without taking a deep dive into the statistics, a few common themes could help explain it. Pitchers have never thrown harder or featured nastier secondary offerings. Defenses have never shifted more to counter tendencies on batted balls. Hitters have never sold out more in an attempt to do damage — home runs and extra-base hits are the goal, not simply putting the ball in play.

“It’s where we’re at right now in the game,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said. “Pitching is that good and offense is taking a while to make adjustments.”

To suggest many hitters can match Bogaerts with their respective skill sets and physical tools would be foolish. He was a premier prospect before his 2013 debut with Boston and has developed into one of the game’s top sluggers. Bogaerts carried an even 1.000 OPS into Thursday’s series finale with the Blue Jays at TD Ballpark in Dunedin, Florida.

But the 28-year-old has found a way to marry his considerable talents with an effective approach at the plate. Bogaerts is comfortable deep in counts and isn’t averse to using the whole field with two strikes. He has fanned in 17.2% of his plate appearances thus far in 2021 — Mike Trout was at 28.1% prior to being placed on the injured list with a calf strain this week.

“I actually kind of developed that in the minor leagues,” Bogaerts said. “Listen, I’m in Aruba — I don’t have a two-strike approach. I don’t know anything about that. I’m trying to see the ball and hit the ball hard.

“Coming up through the minors, the hitting coaches and the hitting coordinators just reminded you to shorten up on the bat and give yourself more of a chance. The effort level doesn’t have to be that high. You’re more in a protect-type mode.”

Bogaerts has gone to two strikes in 102 of his 174 plate appearances to date. He holds an .822 OPS in those situations, belting five of his nine home runs. Bogaerts holds a 1.075 OPS with five home runs and seven of his 13 doubles when finishing with pitchers ahead in the count.

“Sometimes I feel like every time I’m up there, I have two strikes already,” Bogaerts said. “I’m taking the first and then I’m fouling off the second — or I take the second, too.

“For me, it’s very weird — I'm extremely comfortable with two strikes. I’ve done it so much. I don’t want to do it. It’s just the way I operate, the way my approach is.”

Nick Pivetta took the ball for the Red Sox on Thursday night against Toronto, looking to give yet another opponent a hard time. The right-hander was allowing just 5.91 hits per nine innings and was limiting hitters to a .189 batting average. Pivetta allowed two earned runs or less in five of his first eight outings, including in a 4-3 win over Trout and the Angels on Friday.

“You get the information,” Cora said. “You prepare. You put guys where you think they’re going to get ground balls.

“It’s not easy right now to hit at this level.”

* MassLive.com

J.D. Martinez belts go-ahead homer with two outs in ninth, Boston Red Sox post 17th come-from- behind win

Christopher Smith

J.D. Martinez’s 250th career home run was a clutch one.

The Red Sox won 8-7 over Toronto on Thursday in Dunedin, Fla., after trailing by two runs entering the top of the ninth inning. It marked Boston’s 17th come-from-behind victory this season.

Martinez belted a 402-foot two-run blast to center field with two outs to put the Red Sox ahead.

The DH connected on an 89 mph slider from Blue Jays right-handed reliever Rafael Dolis who was trying for his fourth save.

Both Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis singled to lead off the inning. Alex Verdugo’s RBI groundout to first base cut the deficit to 7-6 right before Martinez homered.

Boston’s five-run second

The Red Sox scored five runs in the second inning after Blue Jays left-handed starter Steven Matz retired the first two batters.

Christian Vázquez and Hunter Renfroe both singled. Dalbec crushed a three-run homer 349 feet the opposite way off the right field foul pole to put Boston ahead 3-2.

Dalbec connected on a 1-2 curveball.

Chavis followed with a double to right. Kiké Hernández drove home Chavis on an RBI single.

Verdugo’s single put runners at the corner, then Martinez singled to make it 5-2.

Frustrating fifth for Pivetta

The fifth inning was a frustrating one for Red Sox starter Nick Pivetta as the Jays scored twice to tie it on weak contact.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s 94.0 mph single was the hardest hit ball that inning. No other ball put in play had over a 65.2 mph exit velocity.

Cavan Biggio’s single that tied it had only a 59.0 mph exit velocity and beat the shift.

The Blue Jays also scored on Teoscar Hernandez’s 65.2 mph grounder to third that Rafael Devers bobbled for an error.

Pivetta went 5 innings, allowing five runs (four earned), seven hits and two walks while striking out eight.

Chavis’ costly error in sixth

Danny Jansen doubled to lead off the bottom of the sixth and advanced to third on an error by right fielder Hunter Renfroe. Jonathan Davis’ RBI single put the Blue Jays ahead 6-5.

Chavis made a costly error. He failed to catch Xander Bogaerts’ flip to second base on Hernandez’s grounder to shortstop. Bogaerts dived to make the play and it should have ended the inning.

Randal Grichuk then singled to put Toronto ahead 7-5.

Boston Red Sox notebook: Michael Chavis ‘kept his head up,’ delivered big hit in ninth after error; David Ortiz tweets, ‘That’s how we do it’

Christopher Smith

Michael Chavis’ sixth-inning error led to a Blue Jays run, but he made up for it with a big hit during Boston’s ninth-inning rally.

The Red Sox scored three runs in the ninth inning to post an 8-7 comeback victory over the Blue Jays in Dunedin, Fla. on Thursday. J.D. Martinez’s two-run home run to center field capped off the rally.

Chavis connected on an 0-2 slider from Blue Jays right-handed reliever Rafael Dolis who was trying for his fourth save. Chavis sent it for a single to center field after Bobby Dalbec singled to lead off the inning.

“I’m glad he kept his head up today and kept grinding,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said about Chavis. “It wasn’t an easy game for him. But the fact that he had a big at-bat at the end, that’s what we ask from them. We ask that from Michael to J.D. to Xander (Bogaerts) to (Rafael) Devers. Just keep playing the game. And today, he did that and he came up with a big hit at the end.”

Chavis’ error came with two outs in the sixth.

Teoscar Hernandez ripped a 104.9 mph grounder that Xander Bogaerts fielded diving to his left. Bogaerts flipped to Chavis at second base.

But Chavis dropped what should have been a force-out to end the inning. Instead, it loaded the bases for Randal Grichuk who stroked an RBI single to put Toronto ahead 7-5.

“It’s a huge team win,” Red Sox starting pitcher Nick Pivetta said. “It’s massive.”

David Ortiz pumped

Red Sox legend David Ortiz was pumped.

Ortiz simply tweeted “@JDMartinez28″ after the DH blasted the go-ahead homer.

Ortiz then tweeted, “Thats how we do it @RedSox” after Matt Barnes converted his 10th save.

Barnes’ velocity

Matt Barnes struck out the side in the ninth inning and pitched around a walk. He featured his best fastball velocity this season.

Barnes threw seven fastballs, topping out at 98.7 mph and averaging 98.1 mph, per Baseball Savant. His average fastball velocity this season is 95.8 mph.

It was the first time Barnes had pitched since Sunday when he allowed a two-run homer to Shohei Ohtani for his first blown save this season.

“I had a few days off,” Barnes said. “I wasn’t happy with the pitch I threw Ohtani the other day. I feel like I kind of pulled it middle-in and kind of cut it off a little bit. So been working on staying through the ball a little bit the last couple of days. And just tried to transition that into the game and be aggressive through the zone. I don’t know if there’s anything in particular to attribute maybe any uptick in velocity. Just a few days off, pretty fresh and felt good.”

Pivetta pitched better than his line

Nick Pivetta pitched 5 innings, allowing five runs (four earned), seven hits and two walks while striking out eight.

The Jays scored twice against him on weak contact in the fifth inning.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s 94.0 mph single was the hardest hit ball that inning. No other ball put in play had more than a 65.2 mph exit velocity.

Cavan Biggio’s single to tie the game had only a 59.0 mph exit velocity and beat the shift.

The Blue Jays also scored on Teoscar Hernandez’s 65.2 mph grounder to third that Rafael Devers bobbled for an error.

“I felt really good,” Pivetta said. “I had a really good curveball going. I had command of my slider. I felt like fastball command was actually pretty good tonight. As a whole, I felt really good.”

Bogaerts with two strikes

Xander Bogaerts entered Thursday 12-for-40 (.300) after getting behind 0-2 in the count and 15-for-48 (.313) after falling behind 1-2 in the count. He also entered slashing .287/.343/.479/.822 with five homers in 102 plate appearances with two strikes this season.

“I feel comfortable with two strikes most times than not knowing that I can lay off that slider that I had a lot of problems with early in my career,” Bogaerts said.

ERod 0-for-20

Red Sox starter Eduardo Rodriguez is 0-for-20 with 10 strikeouts as a hitter in his career. He will receive another chance to collect his first hit Sunday in an NL park, Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park.

“I’d be really happy if he gets one but I’d also be really surprised,” Bogaerts said.

Bogaerts estimated Rodriguez, who homered a couple times in batting practice this week, has a 1% chance of connecting for a hit.

“Just because he has pop,” Bogaerts said. “Listen, man. If he swings at the right time, the right moment on the right pitch, he can hit it far. I can give him that. He can hit it far. But he needs a lot of things to go in his favor for him to hit it.”

Pitching matchups in Philly

The Red Sox and Phillies open a three-game series in Philadelphia on Friday.

Friday: LHP Martín Pérez (1-2, 3.40) vs. RHP Aaron Nola (3-3, 3.64), 7:05 p.m.

Saturday: RHP Nathan Eovaldi (4-2, 4.20) vs. RHP Chase Anderson (2-4, 6.96), 7:15 p.m.

Sunday: Eduardo Rodriguez (5-2, 4.70) vs. Zack Wheeler (3-2, 2.52), 1:05 p.m.

Red Sox vs. Yankees time change

Boston and New York’s June 6 game at Yankee Stadium has been moved to Sunday Night Baseball. The game initially was scheduled for the afternoon, but it will start at 7:08 p.m. on ESPN.

J.D. Martinez’s 250th homer in ‘rollercoaster’ career allows Boston Red Sox to ‘steal one’ against Blue Jays

Christopher Smith

J.D. Martinez’s 250th career homer turned a one-run deficit with two outs in the ninth inning into an 8-7 Red Sox come-from-behind victory over the Blue Jays in Dunedin, Fla. on Thursday.

“It’s a blessing from God,” Martinez said. “I would never have imagined I’d hit 250 home runs if you would have told me that 10 years ago. My career’s kind of taken a rollercoaster, early on. But God guided me and he got me to here. And I give thanks to him.”

The DH connected on an 89 mph slider from Blue Jays right-handed reliever Rafael Dolis who was trying for his fourth save. He crushed it 402 feet to center for a two-run blast.

He showed some emotion as he rounded the bases.

“It was just a big at-bat,” Martinez said. “Big situation against that team. It’s a team we’re going to be battling with all year. So to kind of steal one like that is big for us. They’re on our heels in the standings. I know it’s early but any time we play them, these are the games you kind of gain those gaps on. So it was a big win.”

Martinez had struck out in his previous at-bat in the seventh inning.

“He works so hard at his craft,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said. “Even in nights that he quote-unquote struggles, he’s one at-bat away from changing the game. He was very upset with the strikeout. ... He thought the pitch was outside. At the end, it was a perfect pitch. But then after that, he went to the cage and he kept working. And he got a pitch up in the zone close to him and he put a great swing.”

Martinez did have a rollercoaster career early on.

The Astros released him during spring training 2014. But he overcame adversity even before that.

It all started June 9, 2009, when the Astros drafted him in the 20th round (611th overall) out of Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He signed two days later and was the sixth outfielder on his rookie ball team, as he told MassLive.com in 2018.

What was his plan against Dolis?

“It’s top secret,” Martinez joked. “Trying to get all my tricks? What’s wrong with you? I was just trying to get a good pitch to hit, honestly. He’s a guy who throws the ball hard kind of everywhere. I’m just trying to get a good pitch to hit.”

Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis led off the ninth inning with singles.

“It was a big win,” Martinez said. “It was a battle the whole game. Chavis and Dalbec did a really good job of getting on base, starting that whole situation in the ninth.”

Boston Red Sox lineup: Michael Chavis returns to lineup Thursday in rubber game vs. Blue Jays

Christopher Smith

The Red Sox and Blue Jays will play the rubber game of a three-game series Thursday in Dunedin, Fla. First pitch is at 7:37 p.m.

Michael Chavis is back in the Red Sox lineup Thursday. This is his first time playing since Sunday.

Boston will face lefty Steven Matz (5-2, 4.29).

Nick Pivetta will start for Boston. The righty is 5-0 with a 3.16 ERA (42 ⅔ innings, 15 runs), 1.17 WHIP and .189 batting average against in eight starts.

Boston Red Sox lineup:

1. Kiké Hernández CF

2. Alex Verdugo LF

3. J.D. Martinez DH

4. Xander Bogaerts SS

5. Rafael Devers 3B

6. Christian Vázquez C

7. Hunter Renfroe RF

8. Bobby Dalbec 1B

9. Michael Chavis 2B

Pitching matchup: RHP Nick Pivetta (5-0, 3.16 ERA) vs. LHP Steven Matz (5-2, 4.29 ERA)

Danny Santana likely to join Boston Red Sox in Philadelphia but Alex Cora ‘can’t comment’ on report that he’s expected to be activated

Christopher Smith

Danny Santana is not in the Worcester Red Sox’s lineup Thursday. The Boston Red Sox are expected to activate Santana for the series that starts Friday in Philadelphia against the Phillies, ESPN’s Enrique Rojas reported Thursday afternoon.

MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo confirmed the report.

“I can’t comment about it,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said when asked about the report. “He’s still in Worcester. I don’t think he’s in the lineup tonight but he’s working out down there. So that’s all I can give you.”

Santana signed a minor league contract with the Red Sox in March. Boston has until Sunday to make a decision on the super utility player who has an opt-out clause if he’s not added to the 40-man roster.

The 30-year-old switch-hitter went 2-for-4 with a double in Triple-A Worcester’s 4-1 loss to Buffalo on Wednesday.

He is 9-for-20 (.450) with two homers, two doubles, four runs, one stolen base and four RBIs in five rehab games for Worcester.

He began his rehab assignment at High-A Greenville where he went 4-for-10 with a homer, double, two runs and two RBIs in three games.

Santana spent time in the hospital during spring training because of a foot infection.

He also underwent an ulnar collateral ligament repair and augmentation procedure last September (per MLB.com).

Santana has played every position but catcher during his career. He batted .283 with a .324 on-base percentage, .534 slugging percentage, .857 OPS, 28 home runs, 23 doubles, six triples, 81 RBIs, 81 runs and 21 steals in 130 games (511 plate appearances) for the Rangers in 2019. That year was an outlier in his career, especially in terms of power. He has a .260/.299/.418/.717 slash line in 509 major league games in seven seasons (2014-20).

Why Boston Red Sox’s Alex Cora will let Eduardo Rodriguez wear Barry Bonds earring vs. Phillies despite his no-earring rule

Christopher Smith

Manager Alex Cora has a no-earring policy. But he plans to make an exception Sunday in Philadelphia for Eduardo Rodriguez who has Barry Bonds-like earrings.

Red Sox pitchers will hit this weekend because Boston is playing at an NL park. Rodriguez is scheduled to start Sunday.

“I don’t let them wear earrings (during games),” Cora said Thursday. “That’s just one of the rules that I have. But for his game, he can actually wear one when he hits. It’s a cross. It is similar to Barry’s. So I’m going to give him a chance to do that to see if he can get a hit. But the chances are very slim.”

Rodriguez is 0-for-20 with 10 strikeouts in his career. He’s 0-for-1 in the postseason but he did reach base once. He got hit with a pitch during the 2018 World Series.

Cora has no confidence in Rodriguez recording a hit.

“Not at all,” Cora said.

Cora also let Rodriguez wear the cross earring when the left-handed pitcher went 0-for-3 with a sacrifice bunt in San Diego during 2019 Players Weekend.

“You saw the results,” Cora said, adding that he hopes Rodriguez proves him wrong.

Cora said he didn’t mind the universal DH last year. He pointed out that the universal DH will be a big topic this offseason as the MLB Players Association and Major League Baseball negotiate a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.

“I do believe honestly that it will be good for baseball in general to have one more hitter,” Cora said.

Cora said he is concerned about potential injuries when his pitchers hit.

“But he went to New York and got one of the best at-bats of the two games — it was Nick (Pivetta) actually,” Cora said. “But yeah, there’s always a concern. Whenever they hit, you just hope for the best and hopefully nothing happens.”

Pivetta worked a 10-pitch at-bat against Mets ace Jacob deGrom in New York earlier this season.

Boston Red Sox injuries: WooSox’ Tanner Houck, Connor Seabold begin throwing progressions and ‘they’re feeling good,’ Alex Cora says

Christopher Smith

Tanner Houck and Connor Seabold both recently began throwing again after being shut down with arm injuries.

“They started their throwing progression,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said Thursday. “They’re feeling good.”

The Red Sox shut down Houck with a sore flexor muscle after he started Triple-A Worcester’s season opener May 4 against Buffalo.

Connor Seabold was expected to start the minor league regular season in the WooSox’ starting rotation. But the righty began Worcester’s season on the injured list because of elbow inflammation that chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom referred to as minor soreness.

Houck, Boston’s top depth starter, is 3-2 with a 1.98 ERA (27 ⅓ innings, six earned runs) in six outings, including five starts, for the Red Sox the past two years.

The 24-year-old has pitched in three games and made two starts for Boston this year. He has allowed five earned runs in 10 ⅓ innings (4.35) but his 2.36 FIP indicates he has pitched much better.

Houck allowed three runs in 3 innings against Buffalo on May 4.

The Red Sox acquired Seabold with Nick Pivetta from the Philadelphia Phillies for Brandon Workman and Heath Hembree last August. Seabold reached 95 mph during a start at the alternate site in April before the injury. His best pitch is his changeup, which plays like a reverse slider.

No update on Bazardo

Cora said the Red Sox do not have any further updates on right-handed reliever Eduard Bazardo — who left Worcester’s game Tuesday night during the ninth inning because of a lat strain.

Bazardo has given up four earned runs in 2 ⅔ innings for Worcester this year.

* The Worcester Telegram

Worcester's own Rich Gedman a hit with WooSox

Joe McDonald

WORCESTER — Imagine being within earshot of Ted Williams when he would stand around the batting cage and talk about hitting. Listening to the stories, lessons, questions and answers from the greatest hitter of all-time must have been incredible for players.

Rich Gedman was one of them.

During his major league career with the Boston Red Sox, Gedman would be a sponge of information anytime Williams was around during spring training, or the regular season. His booming voice, especially when it came to talking about the science of hitting, was heard loud and clear.

Gedman, the hitting coach for the Worcester Red Sox, explained his interactions with Williams were from a distance. He would listen any time Williams talked hitting, or about guys’ swings.

“It doesn’t take much to listen,” Gedman said. “As a friend pointed out, some people are actually looking at you, but they don’t hear anything. There’s a gift to be able to listen, so when you hear things that are interesting from somebody, especially Ted Williams, you stop and take heed whenever possible.

“To us New Englanders, he was probably the greatest offensive player the Red Sox have ever had, at least up until David Ortiz. Certainly (Williams) is the last .400 hitter in baseball, so there’s plenty of credentials with his Hall of Fame career.”

This is Gedman’s seventh season as the Red Sox’ Triple-A hitting coach, which is the longest in franchise history.

The Worcester native, who spent 11 seasons with the Red Sox, enjoys passing along his knowledge and experiences to the future Red Sox players. He actually jokes that he became a hitting coach because that was the available position he was offered.

“He’s great,” said WooSox outfielder Michael Gettys. “He’s very positive, regardless of what’s going on, he’s unbelievably positive. In a game of failure where a lot of negative things are going on, to have someone positive is everything.”

At this level, it’s not about the power numbers. Quality at-bats are more important for development, but the WooSox are putting up some serious numbers in their inaugural season at Polar Park.

The team has hit a total of 17 home runs in the first eight games in Polar Park history. WooSox batters are hitting .251 (64-for-255) in that span, including 46 runs scored.

Gedman is not the type to take any credit, because the players are the ones who put the time and effort into improving their offensive skills.

When he first arrived in the Red Sox organization as a coach with Double-A Portland (2013-14), the organization’s hitting philosophy was different than it is now. The idea was for batters to take pitches in an attempt to work the opposition’s starter and get into the bullpen sooner than later.

Now, teams will utilize bullpens and the variety of arms in the arsenal. So, figuring out the cat-and-mouse game between batters and pitchers is a unique one.

“It’s neat how the game works,” Gedman said. “I’ve always tried to provide an avenue for guys to be able to talk, feel like it’s theirs and not mine. I try never to take credit for anybody’s success and I think I’m fair to everybody.”

As much as he enjoys talking about hitting, Gedman, a former catcher, admitted he was more comfortable being around pitchers than hitters.

“To become a hitting coach was something I had to learn. I’m still learning. I sometimes forget that I try to give information, but I need to sometimes give thoughts about how to approach a certain guy,” he said.

When asked if he’ll share his pitching advice, he joked, saying he should just keep his mouth shut when it comes to pitching.

Gedman credits all the connections and friends he’s met during his baseball career, beginning in Little League, for his success and love of the game.

Other than listening to Williams, Gedman tips his cap to former Quinsigamond and Assumption baseball coach, Barry Glinski.

“We’re forever talking about coaching, people, hitting and just talk about the game in general,” explained Gedman. “We have so much in common and I’ve always had so much respect for him because he was a professor of mathematics and he went to Notre Dame.”

In fact, the two spoke about baseball Thursday afternoon. Along with Williams and Glinski, Gedman said Walt Hriniak had a major impact.

Gedman enjoyed career seasons under Hriniak in 1985 and 1986, especially in the ’86 postseason where he hit .357 in 14 playoff games.

“He taught me how to be a pro,” Gedman said. “He taught me how to go about my business. He taught me how to handle adversity. He taught me way more than the baseball swing itself. He talked about mental toughness and dealing with the stuff going on in your career. We developed a bond where I had complete faith in him and his assesment of my approach to things.”

Gedman shares all of his experiences with the current players.

“It’s cool,” Gettys said. “Every hitter is different, so you’ve got to take things that people say about how they hit, and put it with how you hit. I’ve tried to emulate hitters before and it’s very tough to do that.”

Gedman’s approach to hitting is to the point with the players.

“You try to give them info they can understand and appreciate,” he said. “The good ones you’ll see again. The really good ones should leave an impression on you that you can’t wait to see them again, not worry about seeing them again.”

* RedSox.com

J.D.'s milestone HR (250) in 9th wins it

Ian Browne

If you are down by a run and down to your last out, you might as well have your best hitter at the plate.

It came down to that for the Red Sox on Thursday night at TD Park in Dunedin, Fla., and J.D. Martinez did not disappoint.

Instead, he delivered his team perhaps its most thrilling win yet of 2021, and that is saying something in what has been a memorable first few weeks of the season for the American League East-leading Red Sox.

With two outs in the top of the ninth, Martinez unloaded on an 0-1 slider from Rafael Dolis for a go-ahead, two-run homer that led the Red Sox to a hugely-satisfying 8-7 victory over the Blue Jays.

The way the normally low-key Martinez clutched his fist as he ran around the bases showed how satisfying.

“It was just a big at-bat,” said Martinez. “Big situation against that team, a team we’re going to be battling with all year. To kind of steal one like that is big for us. They’re on our heels in the standings. I know it’s early, but any time we play them, these are the games you kind of gain those gaps on. So, it was a big one.”

The homer was No. 250 in Martinez’s career, and No. 226 since the Houston Astros released him seven years ago.

“It’s a blessing,” said Martinez. “Would never have imagined that I would have hit 250 homers. If you had told me that 10 years ago, my career kind of took a roller coaster early on, but God guided me and he got me to here. I give thanks to him.”

With the win, the Red Sox once again managed to hold on to sole possession of first place in the division, extending their stay alone at the top to 41 days. A loss would have ended that run.

“What an amazing win, what a great game,” said Red Sox manager Alex Cora. “What a big league W.”

This was a game the Sox led 5-2 after a thrilling surge of offense in the top of the second, when, with two outs and nobody on base, they came up with seven consecutive hits.

But with starting pitcher Nick Pivetta having a rare off-night and the defense (three costly errors) melting down in the fifth and sixth, Boston was down, 7-5, entering that final frame.

Bobby Dalbec, who had the big blast (a three-run homer) in the second-inning surge, started the game-tying rally when he singled. Michael Chavis, who made one of those errors by dropping a throw at second base, made up for it with a key single that put two on with none out.

“It was a battle the whole game,” said Martinez. “Chavis and Dalbec did a really good job of getting on base and just starting that whole situation in the ninth.”

When Alex Verdugo hit a fielder’s choice grounder that trimmed the deficit to a run for the second out, it was all up to Martinez.

“Obviously, my job is to hit and to drive in runs,” Martinez said. “Those situations, the team’s depending on me to go up there and put a good at-bat together and hit the ball hard. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. All I can control is my preparation and doing all the work and getting ready for that at-bat, really. The rest is up for chance, really.”

This was the ultimate chance for Martinez to erase the bitter taste of his previous at-bat, when he struck out looking on a low-and-outside pitch that he thought was out of the strike zone.

“He just works so hard at his craft, even on nights when quote-unquote he struggles, he's one at-bat away from changing the game,” said Cora. “He was very upset with the strikeout the last [at-bat]. He thought the pitch was outside, and at the end it was a perfect pitch. After that, he went to the cage and kept working and got a pitch up in the zone, close to him, and he put a great swing.”

After the star slugger took a slider from Dolis for strike one, he mauled the next slider at an exit velocity of 104.4 mph and a projected distance of 402 feet into the jet stream in right-center to put his team ahead for good with the milestone dinger.

For the 27-18 Red Sox, it was sure to be a happy flight to Philadelphia.

“It’s a huge team win. It’s massive,” said Pivetta. “Guys staying in ABs starting off that ninth inning. It’s incredible what these guys can do, but it’s what we’ve been doing. It’s what we’re capable of. It’s what’s going to keep happening.”

Still pals: Cora ready to see Dombrowski

Ian Browne

When the Red Sox arrive at Citizens Bank Park for a three-game series with the Phillies on Friday, Boston manager Alex Cora very much looks forward to meeting up with his former boss.

That, of course, would be Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, who held that same title in Boston for four years.

It was Dombrowski who hired Cora to be the manager of the Red Sox in November of 2017.

Less than a year later, they celebrated a World Series title together at Dodger Stadium.

“Looking forward to seeing him,” said Cora. "He gave me a chance to be a big league manager. He trusted me with a team that had a lot of expectations. People don't understand how much pressure we had in '18 going into that season. It was a team that made the playoffs a few years, they didn't advance [out of the Division Series].

“We added J.D. [Martinez] at that point and everybody felt like 'OK, here we go, it's World Series or bust.’ It was a lot of pressure, but it was a great, great learning experience for us to do that and it gave Dave another World Series and put him where he's at in the world of baseball. It was amazing. We worked together well.”

The Red Sox parted ways with Dombrowski during the final month of a disappointing 2019 season.

After taking a job in Nashville as part of a leadership group that was trying to get a Major League team to that city, Dombrowski reversed course when the Phillies offered him the position of running their front office in December of 2020.

Though Cora was suspended from MLB for the ’20 season, Dombrowski checked in with him regularly as a friend.

“He was one of my biggest supporters personally last year. Once a week, he'd make sure to text me or give me a call and I appreciated that,” Cora said. “The conversations went from baseball to how the kids are doing. I appreciate that from Dave. I'm glad he's back in baseball. He caught me off guard. I was surprised he accepted that job because he was very settled in Nashville, he loved what he was doing, but he's where he needs to be, impacting a baseball organization and I'm looking forward to seeing him.”

Pitchers gear up for ‘hitting’ in Philadelphia

Martín Pérez, Nathan Eovaldi and Eduardo Rodriguez are the three starting pitchers for the Red Sox this weekend in Philadelphia. That means they will get a chance to hit, with no DH in the National League park.

As seems to be about an annual thing, this gives people around the Red Sox a chance to make good-natured fun of Rodriguez and his lack of hitting ability. Including the postseason, Rodriguez has 21 career at-bats, 10 strikeouts and no hits.

Will he be able to get a hit on Sunday against Phillies lefty Zack Wheeler?

“I mean, he’s my boy and all, and I would be really happy if he gets one, but I would also be really surprised,” said Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts. “Wheeler’s a pretty good pitcher, a lot of velocity. Eddie’s bat speed is kind of not too fast.”

What percent chance is Bogaerts giving Rodriguez to get a hit?

“One percent chance, just because he has pop,” said Bogaerts. “Listen, man, if he swings at the right time at the right moment on the right pitch, he can hit it far. I’ll give him that. But he needs a lot of things to go in his favor for him to get it. It’s just that he needs to hit it.”

Cora sounded even less confident than Bogaerts.

“Not confident. No. Not at all,” said Cora. “I don't let them wear earrings. That's one of the rules that I have, but for his game, he can actually wear one when he hits. It's a cross, similar to Barry [Bonds]. I'm going to give him a chance to do that to see if he can get a hit, but the chances are very slim.”

Santana likely to join Sox in Philly

Look for the Red Sox to add veteran infielder/outfielder Danny Santana to the roster for Friday’s game in Philadelphia.

Santana, who wasn’t ready for the start of the season due to a severe right foot infection, has been swinging a hot bat for Triple-A Worcester. He hit 28 homers for the Rangers two years ago.

While reports swirled that Santana all but had his bags packed for Philadelphia, Cora wasn’t at liberty to comment.

“You know, he’s still in Worcester, I don't think he's in the lineup tonight, but he's working out down there so that's all I can give you,” said Cora.

* WEEI.com

J.D. Martinez has his signature moment so far for 2021

Ryan Hannable

J.D. Martinez was off to a terrific start in 2021 and it got even better Thursday night.

Trailing the Blue Jays 7-6 and down to the final out, J.D. Martinez came up big with a two-run homer to right-center field, putting the Red Sox ahead 8-7. Matt Barnes sealed the win with an easy bottom half of the ninth.

The 8-7 win was the Red Sox’ second straight and they will now be in first place in the AL East for the 41st consecutive day.

For Martinez, he entered the day hitting .329 with 11 homers and 34 RBI. And now he has a signature moment to add to his resume for the season.

The home run was just the second go-ahead home run by a Red Sox player in the ninth inning with two outs on the road since the 2017 season. It was also career home run No. 250 for the designated hitter.

“It was a big win, you know, it was a battle the whole game," Martinez said to reporters afterwards. "[Michael] Chavis and [Bobby] Dalbec did a really good job of getting on base and just starting that whole situation in the ninth.”

He added: “It was just a big at-bat. Big situation against that team, a team we’re going to be battling with all year. To kind of steal one like that is big for us. They’re on our heels in the standings. I know it’s early, but any time we play them, these are the games you kind of gain those gaps on. So, it was a big one.”

While it’s still very early in the season, if Martinez keeps his current pace and the Red Sox continue to win, the designated hitter will firmly be in the American League MVP conversation.

The homer continued the theme of the night for the Red Sox at the plate — scoring with two outs. All eight of their runs came with two outs.

Additionally, it was their 17th come-from-behind win of the season, which is pretty impressive considering it is the middle of May.

"What an amazing win, what a great game. What a big-league W," manager Alex Cora said.

The Red Sox will look to keep the momentum going over the weekend with a three-game series in Philadelphia.

* NBC Sports Boston

Are the rallying Red Sox really this good?

John Tomase

There come points in every season when you just have to admit that maybe something special is happening and there's no use questioning it.

The Boston Red Sox have already hinted at multiple such nights this year, whether it's beating New York Mets ace Jacob deGrom, pummeling the Chicago White Sox on Marathon Monday, or walking off the Tampa Bay Rays just five games into the season.

But of all the standout moments early in this improbable never-say-die season, none tops Thursday night.

Down to their final out after blowing a 5-2 lead, they watched J.D. Martinez launch a two-run homer to beat the Toronto Blue Jays 8-7, keeping the Sox alone in first place for a 43rd straight day instead of dropping into a tie with the Rays.

The comeback prompted franchise icon David Ortiz, who's not exactly a prolific Tweeter, to register his approval on social media. "That's how we do it, Red Sox," he exclaimed.

With yet another series victory, the Red Sox once again illustrated that they're harder to put away than a rat's nest. They just keep coming, and it's never obvious from which direction a new hero will scurry.

Martinez delivered the big blow Thursday, but it wouldn't have been possible without singles from Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis and the much-maligned bottom of the order to set the table in the ninth. Even though the Red Sox made three errors, they also saw shortstop Xander Bogaerts range deep into the hole to end one threat and start a pretty double play to end another.

And when they needed to slam the door, they handed the ball to closer Matt Barnes for the first time since he allowed a game-losing homer to the otherworldly Shohei Ohtani, and he responded by striking out the side with 98 mph heat.

More than a quarter of the way through the season, the Red Sox refuse to relinquish their grip on first place despite playing in one of baseball's toughest divisions, with the punishing Jays, the surging Rays, and the sleeping giants in New York.

"We're not supposed to be here," said manager Alex Cora. "Not too many people thought we were going to be in first place probably at all this season. We just keep playing hard, keep playing good baseball, and keep moving on."

Cora noted that even after Ohtani shocked them on Sunday to deny a Red Sox sweep, the club didn't act like it had taken "a punch to the stomach." Nor did anyone fret after getting blown out of the opener vs. the Jays in Dunedin, Fla. a day later.

The Red Sox responded by winning the next two to take the series in dramatic fashion on Thursday.

"What an amazing win," Cora said. "What a great game. What a big-league W."

If you're still on the fence, it's understandable. The Red Sox were terrible last year and they don't seem to field the most dominant team, not with a top-heavy offense, a struggling bullpen, and multiple no-name starters.

But there's just something about this group. They discover a new hero every night. They fear no one. They grind like the Ice Bowl Packers.

And they never, ever think they're out of a game, which they proved once again on Thursday night. Maybe we should stop questioning it and just see where the ride takes us.

"It's incredible what these guys can do, but it's what we've been doing," said starter Nick Pivetta. "It's what we're capable of. It's what's going to keep happening."

La Russa's act a reminder White Sox should have hired Cora

John Tomase

Before the Red Sox could win it all in 2004, they needed to jettison Grady Little and replace him with a new-school manager seeking a second chance. Terry Francona delivered and then some, leading the club to a pair of titles.

Fifteen years later, the Chicago White Sox faced a similar crossroads. The 2020 club led the American League Central nearly all season, the culmination of a patient rebuild finally bearing fruit, before stumbling at the finish and losing the wild card series to the Oakland A's.

They fired the popular Rick Renteria just days before he finished second in the AL Manager of the Year race, recognizing the need for someone younger and more dynamic to take their talented core to the next level. So it came as no surprise on Halloween when they introduced Alex Cora as their 41st manager, capitalizing on the end of his season-long suspension to offer him a shot at redemption while showing the next generation how to win it all.

"In the end," said White Sox GM Rick Hahn, "this was simply too perfect an opportunity to ignore, and while many may disagree with our decision, we're confident that Alex has learned some important lessons over the past year. He's been humbled, and we know he's as hungry as we are to raise our first banner since 2005."

Except that's not what happened.

Tomase: Schedule gauntlet will put Red Sox to the test Instead, White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf stampeded in like the Merrill Lynch bull and made a stunning, perplexing, infuriating hire, unilaterally imposing longtime friend Tony La Russa on the organization. The 76-year-old Hall of Famer hadn't inhabited a dugout since leading the Cardinals to the 2011 World Series and ostensibly leaving on top.

Reinsdorf had other ideas, and he's now reaping the whirlwind, as La Russa keeps inserting himself into generational battles that show how ill-equipped he is to handle modern players. From overtaxing his starting pitchers to not knowing the new extra innings rules to the firestorm he caused in his own clubhouse by castigating breakout rookie sensation Yermin Mercedes for violating some sacrosanct unwritten rule, La Russa seems determined to spark a mutiny in his own clubhouse. It's possible the powder is already lit.

It didn't have to be this way.

Imagine a White Sox club with a rejuvenated Cora at the helm. He has taken a less-talented Red Sox team from worst to first, where they have resided for more than a month. The White Sox, meanwhile, own the American League's best record, but it feels like it's in spite of their manager and not because of him, with the Mercedes controversy the most serious threat to his authority yet.

On Monday, the White Sox led the Twins 15-4 in the eighth inning. Minnesota summoned burly infielder Willians Astudillo to pitch, and he lobbed a 47 mph parabola on a 3-0 count that Mercedes timed perfectly and launched for his sixth homer.

The exuberant DH has quickly become a fan favorite in Chicago for escaping obscurity to lead the American League in hitting and for displaying his emotions proudly. While he circled the bases and teammates waited to celebrate, La Russa fumed.

He then did something Cora would never consider, taking his complaints to the media over the course of two straight days, blasting Mercedes for missing a blatant take sign and accusing him of disrespecting the game. He even endorsed the Twins throwing behind him the next day. It's exactly the kind of get-off-my- lawn drivel that keeps baseball from modernizing and embracing brash stars like Fernando Tatis Jr., Tim Anderson, and Trevor Bauer.

They're the players fans increasingly pay to see, not some septuagenarian manager who just stepped out of Doc Brown's DeLorean and thinks he's still in 1985.

The shame is that during his years as an advisor to Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, La Russa filled a more avuncular role, impressing the baseball operations department with his willingness to engage without being overbearing. It seemed like the perfect way to stay in the game without the day-to-day pressures of running a team, and La Russa was so good at it, the four young executives who led the baseball operations department between Dombrowski's ouster and Chaim Bloom's arrival asked La Russa to remain on the job.

He briefly agreed before leaving for the Angels and spending the year as a special assistant. Then Reinsdorf made the roundly criticized decision to bring him back to the club he had managed from 1979-86, perhaps as a favor for La Russa's role in putting the undeserving Harold Baines in the Hall of Fame.

Meanwhile, the White Sox didn't even engage with Cora, an ideal fit to lead a young club with an impressive mix of Latin stars who'd no doubt benefit from a manager sharing their language and understanding their culture.

Had the White Sox courted Cora, there's a chance he wouldn't have even been available to the Red Sox, who were still sorting through their own candidates. In fact, when the news broke that the White Sox had fired Renteria, there was a belief in some corners of Jersey Street that Cora would land in Chicago.

That never happened because Reinsdorf put his meddlesome foot down and almost immediately discovered he had stepped in something. He was savaged when it came out that he had buried La Russa's DUI admission during the interview process. That set a fitting tone for La Russa's rocky tenure, which has included questionable in-game strategy and a lack of understanding of the game's rules, written and otherwise.

The Red Sox share no such concerns, because Cora has maximized their talents. He should probably be on Chicago's South Side instead, regaling Anderson, Jose Abreu, Lucas Giolito and Co. with tales of World Series titles as a player, coach, and manager.

My guess is that White Sox players would be enraptured with their cocky new skipper and willing to do whatever it took to please him. He might periodically light them up behind closed doors, but that's where it stays. They just want a ring, and it's hard to envision anyone being better suited to give it to them.

* BostonSportsJournal.com

Final: Red Sox 8, Blue Jays 7

Sean McAdam

Down to their last out in the ninth inning, the Red Sox got bailed out when J.D. Martinez delivered a two- run homer to carry the them to their best comeback win of the season, 8-7 over the Toronto Blue Jays.

The Sox entered the ninth trailing by two, but got singles from Bobby Dalbec and Michael Chavis to begin the inning. A wild pitch and a groundout to the right side scored Dalbec and sent Chavis to third. Martinez, who angrily disputed a called third strike in his previous at-bat, got a hanging slider from Rafael Dolis and connected for his 12th homer of the season.

Matt Barnes then closed it out for his 11th save.

The game was a back-and-forth affair, with the Sox scoring five runs in the second while collecting seven straight two-out hits but then not scoring again until the ninth.

They committed three errors along the way, leading to three unearned runs.

WHO: Red Sox (26-18) vs. Toronto Blue Jays (23-18) WHEN: 7:37 p.m. WHERE: TD Ballpark, Dunedin, Fla. SERIES TO DATE: 1-1 SEASON SERIES TO DATE: 2-2 STARTING PITCHERS: RHP Nick Pivetta (5-0, 3.16) vs. LHP Steven Matz (5-2, 4.29) TV/RADIO: NESN; WEEI-FM, 93.7

LINEUPS

RED SOX

Hernandez CF Verdugo RF Martinez DH Bogaerts SS Devers 3B Vazquez C Renfroe RF Dalbec 1B Chavis 2B

BLUE JAYS

Semien SS Bichette DH Guerrero Jr. 1B Hernandez LF Grichuk RF Biggio 2B Espinal 3B Jansen C Davis CF

IN-GAME OBSERVATIONS:

T9: Huge two-out, two-run homer from J.D. Martinez, who drives a hanging slider out to right field, giving the Red Sox their first lead since the fifth inning.

T8: Hard to believe, after the Red Sox put seven straight men on base in the second inning, that they haven't scored since that inning.

B6: Yet another costly error by the Sox costs them -- third one of the night. Michael Chavis drops a feed from Bogaerts at second, enabling Bo Bichette to slide safely into second. Sure enough, a bloop single from Randal Grichuk into right makes the Sox pay with a run-scoring single.

B6: Bobble in right field by Hunter Renfroe proves costly as Danny Jansen takes an extra base, then trots home on a line single to left by Jonathan Davis.

B5: A couple of well-place ground balls -- one on a hit-and-run which created a hole and another through the shift -- prove costly for the Sox as the Jays rally for two and tie it 5-5.

B5: Rafael Devers picks the wrong hop on a chopper down the third-base line, is charged with an error and a run scores to close the Sox' lead to a solo run.

B4: After a stretch that saw him allow three doubles in the span of four hitters in the first, Pivetta has settled in. He's retired seven in a row and 11 of the last 13.

B2: Nice piece of hitting by Bo Bichette, who takes an inside-out swing and, with some help from the wind, doubles over Renfroe's head, scoring a run.

T2: What a beating -- seven straight hits for the Red Sox, producing five runs. And all coming after two were out.

T2: Some alert -- and aggressive -- baserunning on the part of Michael Chavis, who scores all the way from second on a single off the glove of the glove of Santiago Espinal at third.

T2: Bobby Dalbec continues to mash against lefthanded pitching. Four of his five homers have come against lefties, and that three-run shot wipes out an early 2-0 deficit.

B1: Nick Pivetta knocked around for two runs on three doubles, but strands two in scoring position to limit the damage.

B1: Alex Verdugo can't pick up a flyball from in the sun in left field and the Jays take a quick 1-0 lead.

WHAT'S UP: The Red Sox have won four of their last six and nine of their last 15 games...At 13-6 (.684), the Red Sox own the best winning percentage on the road in MLB...Their 3.66 ERA ranks fourth in the AL and seventh in the majors....On Wednesday night, the Red Sox belted four homers -- the fourth time they've hit four or more in a game this season, the most in MLB.. No other AL team has more than two such games...The Red Sox are out-homering opponents, 57- 32 for a plus-25....That is tied for the largest difference in the majors...Meanwhile, Red Sox pitchers have allowed just 0.79 homers per nine-innings, the lowest rate for any American League staff and second-lowest in the game....To date, Sox pitchers have allowed multiple homers only seven times, including just once over the last 16 games....They remain the only team to not allow three homers in one game this season....This marks just the second time in the last 60 years they have allowed two homers or fewer in each of their first 44 games; they also did so in 1992, going 47 games into the schedule before allowing more than two....The Sox have 30 HR in their last 18 games. most in the majors during that time...They also have hit multiple homers in five of their last 6 games....The Sox currently lead the majors in doubles (99), extra-base hits (159), slugging percentage .448), and OPS (.771)...They're second in runs (224) and batting average (.263) behind only Houston in both categories.....Xander Bogaerts leads MLB n hits (55) and is second in batting average (.346)...J.D. Martinez ranks third in hits (53). Rafael Devers and Martinez are tied for third in the majors in RBI (34). Martinez is tied for second in MLB in total bases (96), while Bogaerts ranks tied for fourth (95)...The Red Sox are 7-7 against Toronto since the start of 2020, including 2-2 this season...Nine of the last 14 meetings have been decided by one or two runs...Nick Pivetta is 7-0 with a 2.91 ERA in his first 10 starts with the Sox..The only pitchers to go unbeaten in their first 11 or more starts with the Red Sox are Matt Clement (2005) & Mike Nagy (1969). This is the second ttime the Sox have won nine or more of a pitcher’s first 10 starts with the club ( John Burkett in 2002, 9-1)...In the club’s last 22 games Red Sox starters have a 3.45 ERA ....Boston starters have allowed one homer or fewer in 26 straight games, the club’s longest streak since 2018....Red Sox starters have thrown at least five innings in each of the club’s last 12 games, their longest streak of the season and six innings or more in eights of their last 12 games.....Sox starters have thrown 5.0 or more innings in 37 games this season, tied with the Dodgers for most in baseball....Danny Jansen is 2-for-3 lifetime against Pivetta while Lourdes Gurriel Jr. is 0-for-3....Christian Vazquez is 2-for-3 with two homers off Steven Matz in his career and Alex Verdugo is 2-for-

NOTES:

* There's every indication that utility man Danny Santana will join the Red Sox for the start of their weekend series in Philadelphia Friday, though manager Alex Cora said he had nothing he could add. Santana, who has been on a rehab assignment at Worcester after a foot infection sidelined him in spring training, has an opt-out in his minor league deal Sunday, increasing the urgency for the Sox to add him to the major league roster soon.

* When Santana comes, someone else will have to go. That could be either INF Michael Chavis or a pitcher. Cora hinted that the Red Sox were re-thinking their roster balance Thursday. They've gone with 14 pitchers and 12 position players since the start of the season, but two off-days next week, plus the interleague series this weekend could have them re-thinking that plan. Also, because Santana is not yet on the 40-man roster, the Sox will have to move someone off their 40-man to make room for him.

* Red Sox pitchers have been taking batting practice and running the base this week in anticipation of interleague play in an NL ballpark. "They've been doing their progressions,'' said Cora. "But hopefully, they don't have to swing the bat over the weekend -- a few bunts, a few takes if they have the lead and keep moving forward. Going into these games, it's difficult. But this is where we're at. (I'm very) concerned about Injuries. There's always a concern. Whenever they hit, you hope for the best.''

* Cora has been joking about Eduardo Rodriguez's ineptitude (0-for-20 lifetime with 10 strikeouts) at the plate. Asked if he had confidence in Rodriguez at the plate, Cora responded: "None at all.''

* Cora said he's looking forward to seeing Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski Friday. "He gave me a chance to be a big league manager,'' said Cora. "He trusted me with a team that had a lot of expectations (in 2018). We worked together well. It didn't end up the way we planned, but things happen. He was one of my biggest supporters (in 2020); once a week, he would make sure to text me or give me a call. I appreciated that. I'm glad he's back in baseball.''

BSJ Game Report: Red Sox 8, Blue Jays 7 -- Sox roar back with three in the ninth to take series

Sean McAdam

All you need to know, in quickie form, about the Red Sox' win over the Blue Jays, complete with BSJ analysis and insight:

HEADLINES:

Sox storm back to win a wild one: This was one crazy game, with several lead changes, seven straight hits by the Red Sox in the second inning and three costly errors resulting in almost half of the seven Toronto runs being unearned. The Sox fell behind by two in the first then responded with a huge second inning, when, after two were out, the Sox put eight consecutive men on base and seemed as though they were going to make it a short night for Blue Jays starter Steven Matz scoring five times. But oddly, after the second inning, the Sox didn't score again until their three-run rally in the ninth. When it was over, it ranked as the best comeback win of the season. Before Thursday's epic ninth inning, the Sox had already posted 16 come-from-behind wins. That figure, however, can be a little misleading, since technically, a team can get credit for a comeback win if they fall behind 1-0 in the first inning and manage to end up winning the game. This wasn't like that, however -- this was an honest-to-goodness actual comeback, culminated by the go-ahead two-run homer with two outs in the ninth from J.D. Martinez.

Some ugliness along the way: After taking a 5-2 lead in the second, not only did the Sox stop producing offensively but they also seemingly forgot how to catch the ball. From the fifth through the sixth innings, the Red Sox committed three errors in the field that led directly to three unearned runs, and, their lead. In the fifth inning, Rafael Devers misjudged an in-between hop on a high chopper and couldn't secure the ball as a run crossed the plate and the Jays pulled even. Then, it got worse in the sixth as Toronto re-took the lead. Hunter Renfroe, backing up Kike Hernandez's failed diving attempt at a fly ball, couldn't pick up the ball cleanly on the warning track, allowing Danny Jansen to go from second to third, from where he soon scored the go-ahead run. Then, just when it seemed like the Sox were going to escape the inning being down by just one run, Michael Chavis couldn't secure a routine flip from shortstop Xander Bogaerts on what should have been an inning-ending forceout. Eventually, the Sox' bats came to the rescue, but before they could beat the Jays, they had stop beating themselves with sloppiness in the field.

TURNING POINT

The Red Sox entered the top of the ninth inning trailing by two, seemingly headed for defeat and a loss of the series. But Bobby Dalbec reached on a grounder behind first base and Michael Chavis followed with a single of his own, giving the Sox two runners on and no out. Eventually, after the runners advanced on a wild pitch and Dalbec scored on a groundout to the right side by Alex Verdugo, Martinez provided the big blow to put them ahead. But none of what happened would have taken place had not Dalbec and Chavis ignited the rally with back-to-back singles, putting the Blue Jays on in the defensive almost from the start of the inning.

TWO UP

Kiké Hernandez: Hernandez has returned from a short IL stint like he was shot out of a rocket, with two more hits, giving him six in the three-game series against Toronto.

Matt Barnes: After blowing his first save of the season Sunday against the Angels, Barnes slammed the door in the ninth, recording three strikeouts around a two-out walk.

ONE DOWN

Hirokazu Sawamura: Although both runs charged to him were unearned and few of the balls hit off him were hard, Sawamura created too much traffic with three hits and a walk in just two-thirds of an inning.

QUOTE OF NOTE

"What an amazing win, what a great game, what a big-league 'W,' '' - Alex Cora.

STATISTICALLY SPEAKING:

* The Red Sox tied a season-high by committing three errors. They also did so May 4 vs. Detroit.

* The win improved the Sox to 12-6 against teams in their own division.

* This was the third time this season the Red Sox won after trailing by eight innings.

* Although he didn't factor in the decision, the Red Sox are now 10-1 in Nick Pivetta's first 11 starts with the club.

* The homer in the ninth was No. 250 in J.D. Martinez's career.

* Marwin Gonzalez, a defensive replacement in the bottom of the ninth, got into the 1,000th game of his career.

UP NEXT

The Red Sox begin an interleague series in Philadelphia against the Phillies at 7:05 p.m. with LHP Martin Perez (1-2, 3.40) facing RHP Aaron Nola (3-3, 3.64)

* The Athletic

J.D. Martinez hits 2-run homer, Matt Barnes gets save: 12 observations after best Red Sox win of the year

Chad Jennings

By the seventh inning, Thursday night had all the markings of a Red Sox letdown. They’d controlled the game early but had blown it through walks, soft contact and spotty defense. They were down two runs, and it wasn’t looking good.

That’s when Matt Barnes started stretching, getting ready for a save.

It’s hard to count out this Red Sox offense, especially in a spring training ballpark with the wind blowing out. Their second two-out rally of the night was a game winner in the ninth inning when J.D. Martinez hit a two-run homer — the 250th of his career — for an 8-7 Red Sox win against the Blue Jays in Dunedin, Fla. Barnes got his save, finishing the night with three strikeouts.

“With this offense, if we’re down two or three runs, it’s not a big deal,” Barnes said. “We’re five pitches away from tying a ballgame or taking a lead with the way these guys swing the bat. Especially taking into account the way this series has played, the wind blowing out pretty good to right field the last few days. So, anything can happen in this situation.”

With the win, the Red Sox have won two of three against a Blue Jays team that was widely considered superior when the season began, but Boston has now spent 41 days in sole possession of first place. It has 27 wins, 17 of them come-from-behind.

“We’re not supposed to be here,” manager Alex Cora said. “Not too many people thought we were going to be in first place probably at all this season. We just keep playing hard, keep playing good baseball, and keep moving on. … That’s all we do. We show up, we play, we move on.”

A few observations of this night, this team and where this season goes from here.

1. Best Red Sox win of the year? It certainly felt that way given the opponent (a playoff contender in the division), the circumstances (a pair of two-out rallies, one with the game on the line) and the impact (the win kept the Red Sox from falling into a tie for first place). Surely there will be bigger wins along the way — and maybe there have been more dramatic comebacks already — but for the moment, this felt like the biggest win. This whole season has been a statement, but this win felt like a statement of its own. “It’s massive,” starter Nick Pivetta said. “It’s incredible what these (hitters) can do, but it’s what we’ve been doing. It’s what we’re capable of. It’s what’s going to keep happening.”

2. Count me among those who didn’t know what to make of Martinez this season. I thought he’d be better than last year, but how much better was the question. Well, the answer is, all the way better. His 1.013 OPS is basically the same as his tremendous 2018 season (he had a 1.031 that year) and, given a hitting environment in which everyone seems to be struggling, it’s far more impressive. He’s a monster in the middle of the order again, and when he came to the plate with two outs and two on in the ninth, the sense of inevitable letdown was long gone. He’s just capable of way too much right now.

3. Here’s Cora on Martinez in the ninth: “He just works so hard at his craft, even on nights when quote- unquote he struggles, he’s one at-bat away from changing the game. He was very upset with the strikeout the last one, he thought the pitch was outside, and at the end, it was a perfect pitch. After that, he went to the cage and kept working and got a pitch up in the zone, close to him, and he put a great swing.”

4. And here’s Martinez on being The Guy again: “Obviously, my job is to hit and to drive in runs. Those situations, the team’s depending on me to go up there and put a good at-bat together and hit the ball hard. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. All I can control is my preparation and doing all the work and getting ready for that at-bat, really. The rest is up for chance, really.” He’s hitting the ball so well, I’m not sure he’s really leaving much to chance.

5. Four earned runs through five innings suggests a pretty disappointing start for Pivetta, but he struck out eight and could have escaped a costly fifth inning without allowing any runs. He did walk the leadoff hitter, but the balls put in play that inning had expected batting averages of .060, .060, .060 and .110. That’s a single, a run-scoring error, a near double play fielder’s choice and a score-tying single, all on relatively weak contact. Point is, it wasn’t a great start by Pivetta, but he could have been in a position to win it. He deserved better.

6. Barnes threw seven fastballs, each of them at least 97.8 mph, according to Statcast. His fastball was averaging 95.8 mph this season, but it’s worth remembering that his last time out, Barnes allowed a game- winning home run to Shohei Ohtani and had three days off to make some adjustments. “Wasn’t happy with the pitch I threw Ohtani the other day,” Barnes said. “I felt I pulled it middle-in and kind of cut it off a little bit. So, I was working on staying through the ball a little bit the last couple of days. I just tried to transition that a little bit and be aggressive through the zone. I don’t know if there’s anything in particular that contributed to an uptick in velocity. Just a few days off to get fresh and I felt good.”

7. This was a two-hit game with a three-run homer for Bobby Dalbec. In the past two weeks, he’s hit .315 with four home runs, four doubles and a team-best 15 RBIs. He’s still striking out a decent amount, but he’s been productive and fairly consistent ever since he snapped out of that seven-game hitless streak from late April and into early May.

8. Hunter Renfroe also had a hit, and Michael Chavis had two (including a big one in the ninth inning). The weakness of this Red Sox lineup has been its dependence on the four guys in the middle, but if Renfroe and Dalbec can continue some encouraging signs, the offense will get a lot deeper and a lot more dangerous. “We cannot rely on the big boys the whole time,” Cora said. “They’re going to go through their ups and downs, too. … These kids, these guys, although they’ve been struggling the first month, they’re capable hitters and when they go the other way, it’s fun to watch.”

9. Speaking of the bottom of the order, Enrique Rojas of ESPN reports the Red Sox are planning to call up veteran utilityman Danny Santana on Friday. Cora had hinted the team might add a position player ahead of this weekend’s series in Philadelphia (where National League rules bring pinch hitters and double switches into play). Santana, though, doesn’t have to be a short-term boost off the bench. He’s a versatile switch hitter who had an .857 OPS with the Rangers in 2019. He fits Cora’s mix-and-match style and could be a candidate for semiregular at-bats in left field or at second base.

10. We’ll have to wait for an official move to add Santana, but the Red Sox will have to open a 40-man roster spot for him. They could do that by designating reliever Austin Brice for assignment. The Red Sox have liked Brice’s stuff for two years now, but he’s been even worse this season than he was last season (and he’s basically the ninth man in a nine-man bullpen). Cora said there was no move to announce after the game so presumably, it will wait until pregame Friday.

11. The Santana move ultimately could be the beginning of the end (at least temporarily) for Franchy Cordero. If the Red Sox are going to lengthen their bench for this weekend’s series, the Red Sox will have to get rid of a pitcher, but Christian Arroyo is also getting close to a return from his hand injury. Assuming that happens sometime next week, the Red Sox could option Chavis (but he’s actually helped) or cut Santana (but what’s the point of that?) or they could option Cordero to Triple A where he can get everyday at-bats and try to tap into his tools and potential. With Santana, Renfroe, Alex Verdugo, Kiké Hernández and Marwin Gonzalez (plus Martinez occasionally and Chavis in a pinch), the Red Sox would be well covered in the outfield. Cordero’s had his opportunity, and it’s just not happening for him.

12. Good point by Chris Hatfield of SoxProspects: The Red Sox don’t have much easily accessible roster depth at the moment. Their 40-man roster includes six injured minor leaguers, plus four others who are relatively inexperienced and probably not ideal call-up options just yet. That leaves Triple-A relievers Colten Brewer and Brandon Brennan, plus infielder Jonathan Araúz, as the only easy call-up options. Anyone else is either going to require an additional 40-man move (like Santana) or perhaps be in over their heads (like Marcus Wilson or Jay Groome). Might not matter, but it’s worth keeping in mind.

Zack Scott took over the Mets’ front office in a time of turmoil. Who is he as a baseball executive?

Tim Britton

During the drive east from Fort Myers, along single-lane roads that require high beams, all the way to a dirt parking lot outside a place called the Buckingham Blues Bar, the members of the Red Sox front office felt uneasy.

“Where the hell are we going?” Raquel Ferreira wondered. “It was like a scene in a movie: ‘Oh my God, I hope people know we’re here.’”

“Just the middle of nowhere,” said Ben Cherington. “Divey blues bar.”

“Our baseball ops khakis and polo shirts didn’t necessarily fit in,” laughed Brian O’Halloran.

Inside, on the stage at Wednesday’s open mic night, was the reason they’d all made the drive: Zack Scott was playing the harmonica.

“Zack’s on stage, freaking killing it. I’m like, is this even happening right now?” Ferreira said, remembering when Scott, now acting GM of the New York Mets, had barely talked as an intern in Boston. “Un-fucking-believable. He blows your mind.”

“He’s fairly reserved on the surface,” said O’Halloran. “And then you see him just going crazy onstage playing an incredible harmonica and interacting with the crowd and really getting into it. It’s amazing to watch him play.”

Toby Evers had learned that earlier. Scott’s high school buddy from Natick, Mass., Evers was about to take the stage with his band at Mama Kin on Lansdowne Street, just beyond Fenway Park’s Green Monster, when Scott approached.

“Can I sit in on a couple songs with you?” Scott asked.

“I didn’t even know he played an instrument,” Evers recalled now. “And he jumped up on stage, and he lit the world on fire.”

Zack Scott got his start in baseball the same way he used to find the stage: He asked for time.

The call from Sandy Alderson came at 8 a.m. on Jan. 19. Jared Porter had been fired for sexual harassment of a reporter while he was with the Cubs in 2016; Scott would be leading the organization’s daily morning meeting at nine. Here was Scott’s dream job, a position made vacant because one of his closest friends in the business had done something heinous.

“It’s really complex,” Scott said, two months later, about the emotions that accompanied his promotion. “You have this event that comes to light that is an awful thing. But it’s also a close friend, and you care about your friend.

“I know we’re in a very binary world these days where there’s not much nuance. When you’re in the position I’m in with a person you’re close to and who you believe is a good person, good people can do awful things. And it’s not to excuse it.”

In the months since Porter’s dismissal, the Mets have embarked, not always willingly, on an overdue reckoning with their organizational culture. The Athletic has reported on Mickey Callaway’s harassment of women before, during and after his tenure as New York’s manager, on unwanted advances made by minor- league hitting coordinator Ryan Ellis prior to his firing, and on a workplace environment often hostile to women. Owner Steve Cohen has hired an outside law firm to review that organizational culture.

Porter had been one of the reasons Scott took the job in Queens. The two had worked closely in Boston when Porter headed the club’s professional scouting department and Scott helped lead its analytics division: Twice each year, they’d collaborate on a thorough review of every player in professional baseball, merging Scott’s objective perspective with Porter’s subjective evaluation.

Still, the 43-year-old Scott had certainly been disappointed when the Mets had initially bypassed him for the GM job to hire Porter in mid-December. He’d spent years working with Theo Epstein and Josh Byrnes, Cherington and Jed Hoyer, O’Halloran and Mike Hazen — all of whom he watched land GM positions before he ever interviewed for one. Often, he helped prep them for those interviews. So when the Mets reached out?

“It was nice to actually be thought of as someone worthy of getting an interview,” he said.

Scott had reached that point by riding a 17-year roller coaster in Boston. He’d worked under five general managers and with six managers. He’d won four World Series and seen four last-place finishes. He’d lived through late-night hirings and firings, Bobby Valentine and Epstein’s brief winter hiatus in 2005 — when Scott started feeling comfortable enough to show off his personality in the front office.

He’d been exposed to different personalities and philosophies in the front office, and he’d learned how to respond personally and organizationally when things don’t go as planned. Alderson cited that “breadth of experience” as what had originally appealed to the Mets, and he’s gotten to see how rapidly Scott has adapted to shifting circumstances with New York.

“We’ve worked well together,” Alderson said. “His relationships with the rest of the staff have been very positive.”

With the Mets, Scott is responsible for the front office’s daily interaction with the coaching staff and the player development department. Alderson remains involved, but he said he can “pick and choose” how deeply he engages on any topic.

“He’s detailed, he pays attention,” manager Luis Rojas said. “He’s a good communicator. His demeanor is pretty easygoing, but outspoken — not holding back, not quiet. We appreciate that because we have the ability to talk about any topic at any time.”

The acting general manager of the Mets did not arrive here in replicable fashion. Young enough to have been hired by Epstein, old enough to enter the game before “analytics” was an intractable part of its lexicon, Scott has built his ascent on constantly trying to prove himself worthy of more.

His rise started with a cold call, via email.

“I got an unsolicited email from Zack, and I loved what he had to say,” said Tom Tippett, the founder of Diamond Mind, a baseball strategy simulator. “He told me that when he was 13 years old and all of his friends were playing outside, he was inside reading the Bill James abstracts. That was the line that caught my attention.”

Scott had fallen hard for baseball and the Red Sox as a 9-year-old during the 1986 World Series, ironic given his career path. His older brother, Chris, introduced him to Strat-o-matic, and a kid who preferred math in school was hooked. He devoured the Sunday Globe with its columns of agate player stats and books like the Elias Baseball Analyst and Bill James Abstract.

As a statistics major at the University of Vermont, studying which trees grow best on ski slopes or which pig feed provides the best value for the local farm, Scott became fascinated by how numbers could reveal a story.

“Like any science, data science is the search for the truth,” Scott said. “It’s trying to understand what’s really going on.”

Diamond Mind did not have an open position when Tippett read Scott’s email. But subsequent conversations between the two impressed him enough that he created a job for Scott.

It was a simple task: Rate every player in baseball — major-leaguers, prospects and historical players. For someone accustomed to scraping box scores for basic stats, Scott was awed by all the data Diamond Mind allowed him to access. His database of player knowledge exploded, and he came to a deeper understanding of aging curves, injury impacts and ballpark factors by seeing the way they had a real-life influence on player performance over time.

“There was a lot that was just foundational for me analytically,” Scott said. “It’s kind of like I was a scout who does it for a while; you’re just doing it through quantified skills, so I can in my head know this skillset is very similar to this player or these five players.”

Scott met Epstein, where else, backstage at a charity concert. The two chatted about Diamond Mind and some potential buy-low additions for the Red Sox ahead of the 2003 season. Scott, then 25 years old, agreed with Epstein that Fenway might work well for David Ortiz. By the end of that season, Diamond Mind was informally consulting for the Sox, and Scott had his foot in the door.

“I have this distinct memory of one of the shows we were playing in Boston — acoustic show, small show,” Evers, Scott’s high school friend, said of a night in the summer of 2004. “And Zack missed soundcheck.”

By that point, Scott was a regular presence in Evers’ new band, Buddahead, when they played around Boston. But that night, that July 31 night in 2004, Scott’s day job was particularly stressful.

“He shows up and his face is white as a ghost, and he just wouldn’t talk about what was wrong,” Evers said. “By the time we finished playing, it had hit the news.”

Scott had rushed the mile down Comm. Ave. to Paradise Rock Club from Fenway Park, where he had just spent the day in a protracted argument over whether the Red Sox should trade Nomar Garciaparra. He was an intern with the Sox that year, but one trusted enough to be part of the decision-making team, to be pitted in one-on-one debates arguing the merits of dealing the face of the franchise with more experienced executives.

“He definitely was an important, different perspective,” said Cherington, who worked in Boston’s front office from 1999 to 2015 and is now the GM of the Pirates. “It’s funny. Now we’re fighting to make sure there’s enough scouting or subjective perspective involved. When Zack first got involved, it was the opposite … He was maybe the only perspective that was really, truly coming from the objective lens.”

How did Scott state his case?

“Well-articulated arguments backed up with objectivity,” Cherington said.

“Zack has always been very objective and measured in his presentation but very convicted in his thoughts or recommendations,” said O’Halloran, now Boston’s general manager. “He was definitely not afraid to make his point and to argue.”

“Zack is one of those people that is so smart and doesn’t make you feel stupid when you’re talking to him,” said Ferreira, now Boston’s executive vice president and assistant GM. “I’ve been around so many people in baseball that when they talk, you’re like, ‘Do you really talk like that? Talk normally.’ Zack is normal, but he’s so incredibly smart and talented.”

That night in ’04, Scott was so stressed by the Garciaparra debate that he didn’t reflect much on his earlier contribution. Epstein’s other task for the intern had been to research and rank potentially available fourth outfielders. On the top of the list Scott handed to Epstein that July 31? Dave Roberts.

That wouldn’t be the only time he had a hand in acquiring a postseason hero for Boston.

“Koji Uehara,” Cherington said. “We didn’t really need Koji, but we signed him (before the 2013 season) because Zack was this really strong advocate for a while.”

When Joel Hanrahan and Andrew Bailey, the two closers Cherington had acquired the previous two offseasons, went down with injuries, Uehara filled the void. He recorded the last out of the World Series.

“So Zack basically fixed all my mistakes,” Cherington said.

In September 2018, a Red Sox team official pointed to the unfathomable standings on the Green Monster, the ones that showed Boston with 100 wins and more than two weeks to play.

“The reason we’re where we are there,” the official said, “is because of what they’ve done up there,” pointing to the office that houses the club’s department of analytics.

Over the previous four years, Scott had remade that department, turning an increased investment from ownership, increased autonomy from the front office and increased interest from the dugout into a baseball behemoth. Given the chance to build his own team of analysts as the vice president of research and development under Dave Dombrowski in 2015, Scott embraced every part of the challenge.

“That was really the first time I felt like I was put in a leadership position,” Scott said. “I loved it. I thought that managing people would be a strength of mine, and then I actually had a chance to show it.”

“He involves everybody when he builds this team around him,” Ferreira said. “He really trusts and involves everybody in the entire process, which makes you want to run through a wall.”

“He cares about the people that work underneath him and their development,” O’Halloran said. “He’s very straightforward with feedback to help someone get better, whether positive or constructive criticism.”

When the Red Sox hired Alex Cora as their manager ahead of 2018, Scott gained an ally in the dugout. The two talked daily.

“Communication-wise, he was amazing with me,” Cora said late in spring training. “He gave me a lot of ideas. He listens, he’s open-minded.”

That charmed, nearly perfect season for Scott and the Red Sox firmly convinced him of one more thing: He could be a general manager. He was just waiting for his time.

In January 2004, Scott was presented with two chances. Impressed by the work he’d put in with Diamond Mind, the Red Sox offered that internship to him. Impressed by the work he’d put in with his harmonica, Buddahead offered him a trip to Japan to tour for their debut album.

“I wasn’t ever going to have that experience offered to me again,” Scott said of a tour. “But I wanted baseball to be my career. So it really wasn’t that hard a decision.”

Seventeen years later, Evers can’t argue.

“I work in digital marketing right now,” he chuckled, “so who made the good decision?”

Meanwhile, Scott is New York’s acting general manager. Might that title be shortened by a word soon?

“Oh, that’s a possibility,” Alderson said.

What does Scott need to make the promotion more permanent?

Alderson didn’t hesitate.

“Time.”

‘What are we even doing here?’: Around baseball, players raise concerns about pitchers’ use of foreign substances

Ken Rosenthal and Brittany Ghiroli

Riding the bus back to the team hotel after a recent game, members of a National League club passed around the ball from a rookie’s first hit. The players were stunned by how sticky the ball was — how hours after the ball was taken out of play, they were still picking glue strands off the rawhide.

“What are we even doing here?” a pitcher on that team said.

Many in the game are asking the same question about pitchers who illegally apply foreign substances to baseballs. The problem remains rampant even in a season when Major League Baseball says it is taking additional steps to enforce rules prohibiting such conduct, including examining balls from every pitcher.

“Everyone has swing-and-miss stuff from top to bottom, and it’s not because everyone got so much better in the last three years,” Phillies catcher J.T. Realmuto told reporters on Wednesday. “To be honest, that stuff helps a lot.

“Let the hitters take steroids and (pitchers) can do that (to keep pace).”

Realmuto was obviously being facetious. But just as the league was slow to crack down on the use of performance-enhancing drugs, some within the sport believe it is reacting too deliberately to the elevated spin rates and improved performances of many pitchers in recent seasons.

The current enforcement is minimal, in part because umpires generally act only when prompted by managers, and managers hesitate to single out opposing pitchers when pitchers on their own staff also might be breaking the rules. The league says that before fundamentally changing the system, it needs more time to collect data from its increased monitoring and inspection efforts as well as the spin-rate analysis outlined in a March 23 memo to clubs. Those efforts might not produce tangible results until 2022, though discipline this season is possible.

Seven weeks into the season, however, no discipline has been announced. If warnings have been issued, they have not been made public. The frustration — even among some pitchers — is palpable.

“It is getting out of hand,” said an American League pitcher, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “When you watch some of these guys from the dugout you can almost hear the ball ripping out of their hands. Guys are doing stuff now that you can’t do to a baseball with just your hand. You just can’t.”

The use of illegal foreign substances by many pitchers is not the only factor driving the sport’s declining offensive numbers, which include a .236 batting average and 24.1 percent strikeout rate, both of which would be records over a full season, and six no-hitters in the season’s first seven weeks, already just one shy of the major-league mark.

The power-driven approaches of hitters, use of pitchers in shorter bursts, rise of defensive shifts and deadening of the ball this season all are potentially contributing to the pitching dominance. And while the analogy between illegal substances and PEDs is not precise — both pitchers and hitters benefited from PEDs — some players see similarities in the competitive advantages users gain.

The problem, those players say, has only grown worse since Dodgers right-hander Trevor Bauer, then with Cleveland, first used The Steroid Era as a comparison in 2018. (Bauer remains part of this conversation, albeit from a different perspective. Less than one week into the current season, umpires collected multiple balls he threw against the A’s that had visible markings and were sticky, sources said.)

“It’s pretty frustrating picking up a foul ball and seeing it covered in sticky stuff,” Marlins outfielder Adam Duvall said. “At the end of the day, you would like to know that you are on a level playing field with your opponent. That doesn’t seem to be the case at times.”

Said the NL pitcher, who spoke on condition of anonymity, “It’s the same thing as (Sammy) Sosa and (Mark) McGwire bopping all those home runs. Everyone knew, at least everyone on the inside, knew what they were doing. And then you have guys who are like, ‘I better do something or I won’t have a job.’ And then you have guys who are on the fence like, ‘Will I sell my soul for ‘X’ amount of money?’ And a lot of them are going to say yes.

“The league talks about a level playing field, but how is this level?”

Not long ago, certain players lodged similar complaints about PEDs. The league first banned the drugs in 1991, when former commissioner Fay Vincent issued a memo saying the use of any illegal drug or controlled substance by players was “strictly prohibited.” But the league, in conjunction with the Major League Baseball Players Association, did not begin testing for PEDs until 2003 and did not institute penalties until 2005, allowing the development of what admitted user Alex Rodriguez called a “loosey- goosey era.”

A similar culture exists around pitchers who, in clear defiance of MLB’s Rule 6.02, apply illegal substances to baseballs. Some merely are trying to improve their grips. But others are seeking better spin rates and results.

“Most players, if you go into a clubhouse and you see a pitcher putting stuff on his glove, the hitters give him a hard time but that’s it,” another AL pitcher said. “They don’t like it but they won’t stop it. They know everyone is doing it and they want to win. What good is only stopping your guy from cheating? Makes no sense.”

Royals general manager Dayton Moore said even hitters agree that baseballs require a certain level of tackiness for pitchers to control their pitches. No longer, however, is this simply a question of safety for hitters, who are getting hit by pitches at a record pace in part because pitchers are throwing with greater velocity and better movement. Certain advanced substances help produce greater spin rates than, say, a combination of sunscreen and rosin.

Since the start of the Statcast era in 2015, the percentage of fastballs thrown with spin rates over 2400 RPM has nearly doubled, from 18 percent to 35 percent. The NL pitcher, like others before him, said it is impossible to achieve such dramatic increases in spin rate naturally. Hall of Fame pitcher Jim Palmer and White Sox hitting coach Frank Menechino are among those who said the substances also help enhance movement on breaking balls.

“They are using stuff, I think it is very obvious,” said Palmer, a member of the Orioles broadcast team. “It’s blatant even if you can’t see them going to their forearm or anything every second. I hit 38 guys in (3,948) innings and now people are saying you need it for grip? It’s an excuse, we all know that. They are using it to be better.

“All of a sudden, you can take any pitcher and increase his spin rates. We have to look at why that’s happening, if (league officials) want to change it. Do they want to change it? Or does everyone just like no-hitters?”

The blatant examples are the ones that bother baseball people most.

“I’ve seen three or four cases this year where I’m like, ‘Are you s——- me?’” said Menechino, the hitting coach for the second-highest scoring team in the majors. “If MLB is watching this, how are they missing this one?”

The league, before it acts on any violations, first wants to understand the depth of the problem, MLB officials said. In his March 23 memo, MLB senior vice president of on-field operations Michael Hill informed clubs that the league would inspect and document balls taken out of play this season and conduct spin-rate analysis on pitchers who are suspected of using foreign substances.

The memo stated that players are subject to discipline “regardless of whether evidence of the violation has been discovered during or following a game.” But the league, knowing any suspension would be subject to challenge from the union, wants to gather as much evidence as possible to build potential cases against pitchers it suspects of using illegal substances.

“The Central office data collection is ongoing,” an MLB official said.

A long-term solution would be to develop a tackier ball that produces adequate grip, in theory eliminating the need for pitchers to use foreign substances. The league took partial control of the baseball manufacturing process when it partnered in 2018 with a private equity firm co-founded by Padres owner Peter Seidler to purchase its longtime baseball and helmet supplier, the Rawlings Sporting Goods Company. A new ball, however, likely would take years to test and develop.

Meanwhile, another season might elapse before MLB adopts meaningful change in enforcement.

“So, what, we’re taking a pause on this? We’re going to not enforce the rules for a year?” the NL pitcher asked. “What about guys trying to get paid? What about guys fighting for jobs?

“You have hitters who are like, ‘How the f— are we supposed to hit this?’ For big-league hitters to admit defeat is rare. But when you have a guy throwing a fastball that rises 4 feet or a slider that looks like a strike and drops off another foot, it’s like video game stuff. You think (hitters) are just complaining, but then you look at the video and it’s like, holy s—, how are they supposed to hit this? I don’t care what your approach is at the plate, you don’t have a chance.”

The Royals’ Moore, taking a broader view, said grip was a major concern early in the season during games played in cold, dry weather, leaving some pitchers with a “helpless feeling” when they could not get a proper feel for the ball. However, Moore added, “It is wrong to cheat. If the rules say it’s illegal, then it ought to be enforced.”

Palmer said, “The weather doesn’t matter. You have whatever stuff they are using, and the movement is there. It’s there every night. Everyone is doing it.”

That perception is a problem in the view of one AL pitcher, just as it was during the height of the Steroid Era when some people used the same broad brush to portray all players as PED users. Not all pitchers are cheating, the pitcher said. But now, the accomplishments of even the innocent are occasionally in question.

“It’s not right. It’s just not right,” the pitcher said. “It’s not good for the game.”

Realmuto, in his meeting with reporters Wednesday, cited a number of reasons why offense might be down, including pitchers throwing harder and with more break than ever before.

But he added, “I think the substance issue is real,” then elaborated when asked what suggestions he might make to boost offense, other than lowering or moving back the mound.

“I would just crack down on the substances they use on their hands,” Realmuto said. “You see pitchers out there all game long doing this (touching his mitt). They’re not doing anything about it. I think if they cracked down on that, that would honestly help the offense a lot, get the ball in play more often and (result in) less swing and missing.”

He sees pitchers constantly going to their gloves?

“All the time.”

Until the league starts enforcing its rules, there is no reason to hide it.

— The Athletic‘s Matt Gelb and Eno Sarris contributed to this story

* Associated Press

Martinez’s 2-run homer in 9th lifts Red Sox over Jays 8-7

DUNEDIN, Fla. (AP) — J.D. Martinez hit a go-ahead, two-run homer in a three-run ninth inning, and Boston Red Sox rallied to beat the Toronto Blue Jays 8-7 on Thursday night.

Alex Verdugo had an RBI grounder before Martinez connected on his 250th homer. The two-out drive came off Rafael Dolis (1-1), making his second appearance since returning from a right calf injury.

“What an amazing win,” Boston manager Alex Cora said. “There were so many up and downs.”

Martinez shouted and repeatedly pumped his fists while rounding the bases. He stopped a 12-game homerless drought Wednesday.

“It was just a big at-bat,” Martinez said. “Big situation against that team. A team we’re going to be battling with all year. To kind of steal one like that, it’s big for us.”

Phillips Valdez (2-1) went 1 1/3 scoreless innings and Matt Barnes worked the ninth to get his 10th save in 11 chances. After walking Rowdy Tellez, Barnes struck out Danny Jansen with a 98 mph full-count fastball.

Boston (27-18) held onto the AL East lead. Toronto dropped to 10-7 at TD Ballpark, where the Blue Jays have four more home games cause by Canadian government coronavirus travel restrictions. Toronto shifts home games next month to its Triple-A affiliate’s ballpark in Buffalo, New York.

“They’re young and they’re hungry,” Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts said of the Blue Jays. “It’s going to be very tough for you to beat them 1-0 or 2-1. For the most part, they’re always in the game, so it’s very fun to play against them because you know there’s going to be a lot of action.”

Jonathan Davis and Randal Grichuk had RBI singles off Hirokazu Sawamura in the sixth as the Blue Jays went up 7-5. Grichuk’s hit came after Bogaerts made a diving grab on Teoscar Hernández’s two-out grounder, but second baseman Michael Chavis was charged with an error for dropping a flip toss.

A match up of five-game winners turned into offensive fireworks early.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Grichuk had RBI doubles off Nick Pivetta in the first, and the Red Sox had seven straight batters reach with two outs during a five-run second against Steven Matz.

Bobby Dalbec hit an opposite-field three-run homer that struck the right-field pole, and Kiké Hernández and Martinez contributed run-scoring singles.

After Bo Bichette had a second-inning double, Cavan Biggio had an RBI single in a two-run fifth that tied it at 5.

Pivetta allowed five runs, seven hits, two walks and struck out eight in five innings.

Matz, who gave up five runs and 10 hits over six innings, was in line for the win until Dolis blew the save.

“We’re one out away from taking two out of three,” Blue Jays manager Charlie Montoyo said. “It’s just one of those games. This game was a roller coaster.”

BREAKING THROUGH?

There was some lighthearted ribbing regarding Boston LHP Eduardo Rodríguez’s lack of hitting prowess (0 for 20, 10 strikeouts) heading into his start Sunday at Philadelphia.

“I would be really happy if he gets one, but I will also be really surprised,” said Bogaerts, who put the chance of Rodríguez getting a hit at 1%.

Cora said he was not confident.

Cora has a rule that players can’t wear earrings but will let Rodriguez do it when he bats to see if it helps.

REUNION

Cora is looking forward to seeing former Boston president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, who currently holds the same position with the Phillies. The pair were together during the Red Sox’s 2018 World Series championship season

As for Dombrowski’s legacy, Cora said “he won” and “he did it his way, too.”

TRAINER’S ROOM

Red Sox: INF-OF Danny Santana (foot infection) could be called up from Triple-A Worcester shortly.

Blue Jays: Montoyo said CF George Springer (quadriceps) continues his running progression, but needs to be built up more and will require a rehab assignment. ... LF Lourdes Gurriel Jr. sat out due to a left knee contusion.

UP NEXT

Red Sox: LHP Martín Pérez (1-2) and Philadelphia RHP Aaron Nola (3-3) are Friday night’s starters

Blue Jays: Will face Tampa Bay ace Tyler Glasnow (4-2) Friday night to start their final home series at TD Ballpark. The Rays have won seven straight.

* The Wall Street Journal

Liverpool and the Red Sox Won on His Watch. For Fans, That’s Not Enough.

Joshua Robinson

John W. Henry, co-owner of the Boston Red Sox and Liverpool Football Club, doesn’t make many statements in public. For the shy former commodities trader, that is by design. So when he sat before the cameras not long ago, following the most controversial call of his tenure, fans knew it was significant.

“I know many of you…are disbelieving, or angry, or sad,” he told supporters of one of the most storied teams in sports. “I understand there is little I can say today that will change how you feel.”

With one staggering decision in early 2020, driven aggressively by finances, Henry had invited the wrath of his own fan base and made was widely viewed as an era-defining blunder: The Red Sox had just traded All- Star outfielder Mookie Betts.

When Henry appeared before the cameras again last month after another staggering decision, it came with an air of déjà vu. This time, he was apologizing for signing up Liverpool for the European Super League, a money-spinning project that would have seen 12 elite clubs form their own competition and abandon the Champions League.

The whole enterprise lasted just 48 hours. But it was enough to put Henry in a deeply uncomfortable position. As an owner, he helped guide the Red Sox to four World Series wins in 14 years. During his tenure, Liverpool also won its first English league title in three decades and won the Champions League in 2019. And yet Henry is largely seen as a villain by fans on both sides of the Atlantic.

“I’m sorry, and I alone am responsible for the unnecessary negativity brought forward over the past couple of days,” Henry said in a recorded apology following the Super League fiasco. “I hope you’ll understand that even when we make mistakes, we’re trying to work in your club’s best interests.”

Henry became emblematic of the American billionaires stumbling through the minefield of European soccer. Others include the Glazer family, which owns Manchester United and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Stan Kroenke, the real-estate magnate, whose portfolio contains Arsenal, the Los Angeles Rams, and the Colorado Avalanche.

What all of them have in common is coming to England hoping to cash in on the Premier League’s global appeal, without necessarily grasping the local nuance. Making matters worse, as the English season ends this weekend, Liverpool has not yet secured a berth in next season’s Champions League. (Arsenal is already out of contention.)

“I always used to tell people: U.S. sports are kindergarten and in European football, you’re getting your Ph.D.,’” said Jim Pallotta, a Boston native who learned the lesson when he owned AS Roma between 2011 and 2020.

Henry did not answer requests for comment. Those who know Henry paint him as an aloof businessman with an eye for undervalued assets. He and businessman Tom Werner built their sports enterprise into Fenway Sports Group, bringing together the Sox, Liverpool, a Nascar team, and a New England sports channel. The company was recently valued at $7.35 billion when RedBird Capital Partners acquired a 10% stake.

No corner of Henry’s empire has been noisier than the Northwest of England.

The Super League fiasco has ramped up the pressure on American owners to address the future of their investments in English soccer. Fans want them out. Owners are unlikely to budge. At stadiums around the country, that frustration has spilled into the streets, where fans who are still locked out of stadiums have turned to protesting before games.

The most dramatic was on May 2 when Henry’s Liverpool was due to play Manchester United at Old Trafford. The team never even left the hotel. Thousands of Man United supporters caused the game to be postponed after clashes with police and several hundred protesters broke through security lines onto the field.

Missing out on the Champions League—which can be worth more than $100 million in prize money— would only compound the losses of an already brutal year. Though total revenue reached nearly $700 million for the year ending May 31, 2020, Liverpool still posted a $65 million loss as the first effects of the pandemic hit.

That the club could even be in a position to depend on Champions League money is what drew Henry to the idea of a Super League in the first place.

Hoping to eliminate the uncertainty the biggest clubs face from year to year, he had been in favor of granting them permanent membership to the Champions League or equivalent competition for at least five years, according to people familiar with his thinking. And under the April proposal, each of the 12 clubs would have seen an immediate influx of around $400 million to offset losses incurred during the pandemic. What he hadn’t counted was the reaction from fans.

Boston is home to five major professional teams in different sports. Interest in them ebbs and flows with the seasons. Interest in Liverpool Football Club does not. The passions of European soccer mean that clubs like Liverpool—along with the other Super League rebels—represent cultural identities to their local supporters.

“They’re so out of touch with regular people. They thought they were bigger than all the teams, bigger than the culture, the fans,” Pallotta said of the Super League clubs. “I don’t know how you mess up 100 years of culture and town vs. town and region vs. region because someone wants to make a few hundred million dollars more.”

Henry grew up following the St. Louis Cardinals, not what was happening on muddy pitches across the pond. Still, after FSG acquired Liverpool in October 2010—from a group including Texas billionaire Tom Hicks, who himself faced the intense wrath of Liverpool supporters—he was convinced there were inefficiencies to exploit all over European soccer.

Except when he tried to apply the same Moneyball principles—even attempting to hire the Oakland A’s analytics guru Billy Beane —the club learned a few expensive lessons in losing. Over FSG’s first six seasons, Liverpool only finished in the top four once.

Henry and his acolytes realized that simply hunting for undervalued players in the hyperinflated European market wasn’t going to cut it. So from 2015 to 2019, Liverpool spent over 60% more on transfers than it had in the previous four years, culminating in 2019 when it shelled out some $220 million to build a league champion.

Anyone associated with those kinds of results in Liverpool usually ends up on the fast-track to local sainthood. Yet just as in Boston, the Henry honeymoon didn’t last. Even his own players at Liverpool joined the popular clamor against the Super League project.

Not since a band of rebels dumped tea into the harbor more than two centuries ago has the city cared so much about news from England.

“I still don’t quite understand what the hell is going on. All I know is there are tons of people pissed at John Henry,” said a flabbergasted host of the Toucher & Rich Show on a radio station called The Sports Hub. “The BBC actually sent a reporter from London to Fenway Park!”

“Any word for the fans?” that BBC reporter asked Henry outside the ballpark. “Mr. Henry, we couldn’t hear you earlier. Is there anything you’d like to say to the fans of Liverpool? Is there anything you would like to say? We can’t hear you.”

Henry dipped into his car and drove away. He had done all of his talking in the 2.5-minute apology.

“It goes without saying—but should be said—that the project put forward was never going to stand without the support of the fans. No one ever thought differently in England,” Henry said in the video. “It’s something I won’t forget.”

—Ben Cohen contributed to this article.