Andrew Benintendi And Mitch Moreland Carry The Red Sox Past The Braves
The decision to designate Hanley Ramirez for assignment was a surprising one, but we’re two games into a post-Hanley Era and the Red Sox offense hasn’t skipped a beat against the team with the second best run differential in the National League, the Atlanta Braves. The decision to part ways with Hanley said a couple of things — one, we still value Blake Swihart. And two, Mitch Moreland’s our guy.
Moreland signed a two-year deal for short money to return to Boston after his first season with the Red Sox last year, but his role became a bit complicated when Boston signed JD Martinez a couple of months later. With an outfield of Andrew Benintendi, Jackie Bradley Jr. and Mookie Betts, this moved Hanley to DH and left limited playing time for Moreland. With Hanley out of the picture, that’s no longer the case and the decision to give Moreland the full time gig at first base has paid dividends through the first two games.
In the series opener against Atlanta, Moreland went 2-for-4 with a homer, his eighth in 108 at-bats. On Saturday, Moreland tripled and doubled, driving in two runs on the double that gave Boston a 6-5 lead. His eight home runs don’t seem like a lot compared to the 17 that Betts has and the 16 that Martinez has, but because of his limited playing time, he’s right there with the two in terms of at-bats per home run. Betts has hit a homer once every 10.82 at-bats, Martinez once every 12.13 at-bats, and then it’s Moreland at once ever 14.00 at-bats, the top three marks on the Red Sox.
After a 2-for-5 day at the plate, Moreland is hitting .321 with a 1.046 OPS. Outside of lineup presence, the loss of Hanley is felt the most in the clubhouse right now, as he was always an upbeat guy that kept this group loose on a day-to-day basis, and it might be felt again if he lights it up wherever he goes (my guess is the Rockies), but it was clear that Moreland was the better option offensively with the way Hanley was swinging it, and Moreland was always the better defensive option.
Andrew Benintendi continues to mash at home. He was 3-for-4 with 3 RBI and a couple runs scored. There was a lot of talk about Dustin Pedroia taking over that number two spot in the batting order upon his return, but Benintendi has really turned it on in the month of May, and a lot of that has had to do with how well he’s hit at Fenway Park. After his three-hit performance on Saturday, Benintendi is fifth in the majors in home batting average (.367), and tenth in home OPS (1.084).
Drew Pomeranz was trash again. It seems as though he’s reverted back to the 2016, early 2017 version of himself where it was a miracle if he could give you five innings. The left-hander went three and a third, gave up five earned runs on six hits, walked three and gave up a homer. That’s his third straight start where he’s gone four innings or fewer, and the fourth time in seven starts where he’s gone four innings or less.
Perhaps they’ll give him a little bit of a longer leash to figure things out since the Red Sox are 4-3 in those games, but Boston is essentially operating with three long men in their bullpen because they have three starters — Hector Velazquez, Brian Johnson and Steven Wright — being used as relievers. If Pomeranz sticks to the trend of giving his team four innings or fewer as a starter, then I wonder if Alex Cora might consider throwing Pomeranz in the bullpen in favor of a fifth starter who can give the Red Sox more innings.
My dad Dave Portnoy might get Celtics tickets on the wood, but I had tickets on the dirt at Fenway, so I spent an inning umping for Joe Kelly, who has been sneaky one of the best relievers in baseball this year. Kelly pitched a scoreless 8th inning with a strikeout. Back on Opening Day, Kelly gave up four earned runs and walked three batters in an ugly season debut. Since then, among the 95 relievers with at least 20 appearances, Kelly has the second lowest ERA in baseball (0.37), trailing only Jeremy Jeffress (0.36) of the Milwaukee Brewers. His 0.66 WHIP also leads the American League and is third best in the majors.
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In the series finale, it’s Mike Foltynewicz versus Chris Sale. Foltynewicz has been very, very good for the Braves this year, bringing a 2.72 ERA into Sunday over ten starts. His only dud of the season was at the start of the month when he gave up six earned runs to the Giants. In his nine starts outside of the Giants blunder, he’s got a 1.88 ERA with 58 strikeouts in 48 innings. Sale is coming off a dominant start in which he held the Rays to just one earned run over seven and two thirds innings with nine strikeouts, his fourth straight start with at least nine strikeouts.
Final score: Red Sox 8, Braves 6