BOSTON -- An ominous fog shrouding the exterior of Fenway Park should have been an indicator of bad things to come for the hometown team.
Despite being briefly in control of things early, the Red Sox fell, 8-6, against the Padres on Sunday and in the process lost a third straight series to open the season.
The Red Sox offense came out cold once again, striking out four times in the first two innings, but a patient approach in the third inning put things in their favor early.
Following back-to-back walks, Jarren Duran smoked a one-out double down the right-field line, followed two batters later by an RBI triple off the bat of Wilyer Abreu, who has now hit safely in eight of nine games this season.
The Padres immediately began to chip away at Boston’s advantage, getting three runs back in the top of the fourth before tacking on another three in the fifth to take the lead, stamped by a three-run homer deposited into the Monster seats off the bat of Manny Machado.
“In that fourth inning I left pitches in the zone, and they were able to take advantage of those pitches,” said starter Ranger Suarez, who was again unable to get through five innings for the Sox. “Obviously, that’s not what I wanted to do.”
Boston’s bats woke back up in the seventh, tying the game up on Masataka Yoshida’s two-run double, before immediately handing the lead back to the Padres in the top of the eighth when Jackson Merrill led off the inning with a home run off of Tyler Uberstine, who was making his MLB debut. San Diego tacked on another insurance run in the ninth.
The 26-year-old rookie reliever would get hooked with the loss but was solid in his 2 2/3 innings of work, allowing three hits, a walk and a run while striking out two.
“We felt like he was throwing the ball well,” said manager Alex Cora. “One pitch hit out [of] the ballpark, but he gave us a chance to win the game.”
“It finally happened. It was awesome,” noted Uberstine. “The team came back and put us in a good spot, but I didn’t execute one pitch.”
Suarez lasted just four innings plus one batter, allowing six hits, two walks and four runs on the day.
In his first two starts with Boston, the left-hander has allowed a combined eight earned runs and 13 hits over 8 1/3 innings.
“He'll be the first one to say there's no excuse,” Cora said of his starter. “He was making good pitches … They made adjustments, started swinging at the first pitch, got their hits and then that happened.”
“The first three innings were good,” noted Suarez. “We scored four runs and then went back out there and had them score three. It happened the same in [his season debut against] Houston, and we cannot allow that to happen.”
The Red Sox’s six runs were a season high, with Abreu and Yoshida driving in a combined four of them while also standing responsible for collecting six of the team’s nine hits.
“Offensively, it was better, but it wasn't great,” Cora said.
Following a second straight loss and the seventh in their last eight games, Boston knows there is still a lot of work to be done.
“We’ve just got to show up tomorrow,” said Cora. “We got another tough team coming. They’re one of the best teams in big leagues, so we’ve got to play better baseball. … You’ve got to stay the course. That’s how it works. You cannot overreact to this series. You got to play better, that’s the bottom line.”
“I think it’s just a tough stretch,” added Roman Anthony, who was 0-for-4 with a walk and run in the loss. “We need to find a way to bring more energy and just be better. This is unacceptable to the fans, it’s unacceptable to the standard that we set for ourselves … as a team we expect to win every day.”
The Red Sox welcome Milwaukee in for a three-game series starting on Monday night.