Surprisingly the Boston Red Sox beat the Houston Astros in their divisional series off a win today 4-1 here at the Minute Maid Park in Houston, Texas. 110 miles per hour was the recorded speed for the first pitch thrown by Justin Verlander in his first game back off of a stiff neck injury against the Boston Red Sox. Verlander pitched 5 innings in his first start since June 9th. Verlander unfortunately allowed 4 hits and 2 runs in his 5 inning tenure, however he struck out 6 batters effortlessly.
“I felt like the stuff was pretty good and as the game went along the location started to hone in and the mechanics felt good.” Verlander describes his performance, “I felt good. So I was happy about it.”
Alex Bregman hits his first career leadoff homerun at the top of the first inning off of right handed pitcher Cooper Criswell. He sent the ball flying straight into the middle of the Crawford Boxes, right above the Higginbotham sponsorship sign.
Ceddanne Rafaela, rookie for the Red Sox, hit a RBI double off Verlander in the second inning, putting the Red Sox ahead, 2-1.
“In the beginning moments he’s able to slow it down. He’s doing a lot of good things,” says Alex Cora, Boston Red Sox manager states about Rafaela.
Justin Verlander dropped to a 3-3 in 11 starts, with a 3.92 ERA and the Astros were 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position.
Red Sox RHP Cooper Criswell allowed 4 hits and 1 run in the 4 innings he pitched in. Josh Winckowski came in to replace him in the 6th inning, pitching a scoreless inning, and he was then replaced by Greg Weissert in the 7th, stopping Jake Meyers and Mauricio Dubon from scoring 2 more runs. Chris Martin finished the game off for the Red Sox.
RHP Seth Martinez took over in the 9th inning to finish the game off, however got a dinger off him by Hamilton, putting the Red Sox ahead to win the game 4-1.
