Nick Pivetta couldn’t make it out of the fifth inning on Thursday night, and Ryan Mountcastle hit a game winning three-run homerun in the third inning as the Baltimore Orioles took the rubber match of a three game series with a 6-2 win over the Boston Red Sox at Camden Yards.
Kike Hernandez had given Boston a 1-0 lead taking the first pitch of the game over the fence in left centerfield for his 19th homerun of the season. Pivetta nearly escaped the third inning after a leadoff walk to Tyler Nevin and a single by Pat Valaika. He struck out Jahmai Jones and Cedric Mullins looking, before Mountcastle took the first offering into the batters eye in center to make it 3-1 Baltimore. Nevin added a two-run single and Valaika lifted a sacrifice fly in the sixth. The Red Sox got their other run on a wild pitch scoring JD Martinez in the seventh.
Pivetta (9-8) allowed three runs on four hits with two walks and eight strikeouts in 4.2 innings to take the loss. Garrett Richards also gave up three runs out of the bullpen in the sixth. No Boston batters had more than one hit. The Sox still win the season series over the O’s 13-6, but Baltimore takes two of the last three after Boston had taken 12 of the previous 13 against one another. Valaika and Kelvin Gutierrez had two hits each and Alexander Wells (2-3) allowed just one run over 6.0 innings in the victory. The Orioles are now 52-107. The Red Sox see their record go to 89-70 in what will be a crazy fight between four teams for two wildcard spots, with the wild card game scheduled to happen next Tuesday night. Eduardo Rodriguez (11-8, 4.93 ERA) will head to the mound Friday night as Boston starts their final series of the regular season in Washington. Josh Rogers (2-1, 2.73) gets the ball for the Nationals.
