The Boston Red Sox blew an early 5-0 lead Tuesday night, but got an eighth inning three-run homerun from Alex Verdugo for a 10-8 win over the Atlanta Braves at Truist Park in Atlanta.
The guests got the scoring started early. Kike Hernandez and Verdugo led off the game with back to back singles in the top of the first. With two outs, Rafael Devers hammered a three-run homer over the fence in centerfield. Hunter Renfoe followed that with a solo shot of his own on a 2-0 pitch to make it 4-0. Devers knocked in another run with an RBI single in the third. Atlanta (30-34) rallied on a Freddie Freeman RBI single in the bottom of the third, and then in the fourth got an RBI double from Abraham Almonte and a two-run double from Ronald Acuna Jr. to slice the margin to 5-4. Boston (41-27) pushed it back to a three run advantage in the fifth on a Xander Bogaerts solo homerun, and an RBI single by Renfoe. The Braves rallied all the way back to even the score in the sixth when Guillermo Heredia had an RBI single, William Contreras scored on a passed ball, and Freeman lifted an RBI sacrifice fly to left.
In the eighth inning, the Red Sox got lead off singles by Christian Vazquez and Bobby Dalbec. Marwin Gonzalez then laid down a sacrifice bunt, before Hernandez grounded out to shortstop but couldn’t get a run across. The game winner by Verdugo was on a 2-0 pitch, driving one out of the park to center on a ball that kept carrying. Atlanta did get one run back against closer Matt Barnes in the bottom of the ninth, but he would strike out the tying run Dansby Swanson to end the game.
Hirokazu Sawumara (3-0) got the win in relief of starter Eduardo Rodriguez. Rodriguez allowed four runs on six hits with one walk and eight strikeouts in 4.0 innings. Adam Ottavino got his 13th hold, while Barnes picked up his 15th save. Devers led the way with three hits and four RBI. Verdugo had two hits including the game winning three RBI, while Dalbec also had two hits. Chris Martin (0-3) took the loss for Atlanta in relief of starter Tucker Davidson. Acuna Jr. and Heredia both had two hits. The teams finish off their short two game series on Wednesday night. The Sox send RHP Garrett Richards (4-4, 4.09 ERA) to the hill, against RHP Ian Anderson (4-3, 3.26) for the Braves.
