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The Red Sox played their first night game of 2020 on Monday as they went up against the Braves, and it went well for the good guys. The offense struggled to get much going, but the pitching held up and led the way in a 2-1 victory. Some notes!
Another good showing from Ryan Weber
The Red Sox have two open spots in their rotation for as long as Chris Sale is out, or at least they did. Ryan Weber was the favorite for a rotation spot when pitchers and catchers first reported to camp, and he’s done nothing since then to solidify his spot. At this point, it’d be a big surprise if he wasn’t a starter when the season began. Monday’s game was a particularly impressive one for Weber as he went up against a talented (albeit Ronald Acuña-less) Braves lineup. The righty ended up going four innings in total, allowing just a single and striking out four. He ended his day by retiring the final ten batters he faced. Weber has now tossed nine innings this spring with just one unearned run crossing the plate. He’s allowed six hits and hasn’t issued a walk while striking out eleven batters. We shouldn’t read into stats this time of year, but also Ryan Weber is going to win the Cy Young in 2020.
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Your daily battle update
Obviously Weber pitched, as mentioned above, and he is only barely in a battle at this point. Other than him, there wasn’t a whole lot of action on the pitching front. Jeffrey Springs did pitch, though, and he is fighting for a bullpen spot. The lefty had a pretty solid day, too. His first inning of work was fantastic as he struck out two in a 1-2-3 inning. In the ninth, his second inning on the mound, he did allow some hard contact but was bailed out a bit when Chad De La Guerra started a pretty nifty double play at third base. In all, Springs tossed two scoreless innings on a single and three strikeouts.
On the other side of the ball, Tzu-Wei Lin made his return after missing some games recently with a tweaked hamstring. He had a nice day, dropping a sac bunt in his first at bat and then singling in his next. Marco Hernández also had a hit (and an RBI) in this game while Jonathan Araúz came in off the bench and went 0-1. Meanwhile, Kevin Plawecki and Jonathan Lucroy both started. The former went 1-3 with a walk while the latter went 1-1 with two walks.
Other Notes
- Brandon Workman got an inning of work in this game. It was far from a perfect outing as he loaded the bases before recording an out. He got out of it, though, thanks to a line drive hit right at José Peraza that resulted in a double play and then a strikeout to end it.
- Marcus Walden came in after Workman. He struggled a bit in his first inning, hitting a batter who eventually scored on a sacrifice fly and also allowing a single later in the inning. He came back out for a second inning of work and allowed just one baserunner on an error.
- Triston Casas got in this game for the last few innings, striking out in his only trip to the plate. He is a large man.
- Michael Chavis is having a tough spring and that continued today, as he went 0-3 with a strikeout.
- Also getting hits in this game who have not been mentioned were: Andrew Benintendi, who had a double, and José Peraza, who had two singles.
The Red Sox are back with some day baseball tomorrow as they take on the Cardinals at home. First pitch is at 1:05 PM ET and there’s no TV broadcast for this one.