David Price awesome last night at “the Trop”

DP pitched a gem last night at Tropicana Field in Tampa with an eight inning shutout of the Tampa Bay Rays in a Red Sox 6-2 victory.

David pitched 8, gave up just two hits, no runs, with two walks and eight ring ups. Price threw 116 pitches, with 71 for strikes against 45 balls. His change up was superb. It was his out pitch last night at 82-85 MPH. His fastball hit 93 consistently, and his cut fastball came in at 90-91 was very effective with a ton of movement. His curve was good, too. Just an overall terrific performance by the Man. And he got excellent support offensively and particularly defensively. More on that in a moment.

With the victory, the BoSox moved to 70-54 on the season and in a tie with the Toronto Blue Jays for first place in the American League East. Both teams are at 70-54. The Sox have three more games at Tampa, then head home after a long 11 day road trip to face the red hot Kansas City Royals, who have won eight straight and are back in contention for a wild card spot. The defending world series champions are 64-60 and four back of the Orioles for the second spot in the wild card playoffs. Seattle, Detroit and Houston are ahead of the Royals also. They are 8 1/2 back of the Cleveland Indians in the NL Central, so, with 38 games left, the AL Central is not totally over either. The Tigers are 7 1/2 back of the Indians in the central.

David will face a really good pitcher Saturday night at Fenway in Royals left hander Danny Duffy, who is 11-1 with a 2.66 ERA, a 1.01 WHIP (walks plus hits per inning pitched), and has issued just 29 walks while striking out 147. So a huge test for David and the Sox Saturday night, but a lot of work left in Tampa and also a Friday night matchup with KC in which Sox stud righty Steven Wright will start. Wright will be just off the 15 Day DL after having some arm soreness. Wright is 13-5 with a 3.01 ERA. He was an All-Star this year and has perfected the knuckle ball, but was having some arm issues. But he’s good to go Friday. He’ll face KC’s Ian Kennedy, who is 8-9 with a 3.58 ERA. But first things first in Tampa.The Rays are a scrappy team despite their 52-71 record. They’ve always played scrappy baseball and had a lot of success from 2007 to 2012 before they traded David, so it’s always a challenge playing them.

One last note on Duffy, David and the Sox’s opponent Saturday night. In his August 1st start vs the Rays, he walked 1 and struck out 16 in eight innings of work in a KC 3-0 victory on the road. In his last start against the Twins, which was this past Sunday, he pitched 6.2 innings, gave up 8 hits, one earned with 2 walks and 4 K’s in a 2-1 Royals victory at home.

But back to last night’s game. Chris Young came off the DL to play left field, with super rookie Andrew Benintendi in center, and Jackie Bradley, Jr off last night. Young doubled in a run and shortstop  Xander Bogaerts added a two run shot in the top of the ninth.

Benintendi moved to left in the bottom of the eighth and made one of the plays of the year in MLB and a potential game saving play for David and the Sox. With the Sox ahead 3-0 and the Rays with a man on first, Rays right fielder Steven Souza Jr, hit a shot to left field which Andrew took off after leapt over the left field wall and basically diving against the wall, pulled the ball back in play and saved the Sox from a two run homer. It was a spectacular play by Andrew. He’s terrific. I’ve linked the video of this awesome catch below. You gotta see it.

David came out after the eighth after throwing 116 pitches and battling phenomenally with some great plays by his defense to go along with it. Catcher Sandy Leon threw out another runner trying to steal second. Leon has thrown out 11 of 25 runners trying to steal second, which is 44%, as good as it gets at catcher in any era. He’s terrific. Young made an excellent running catch to his right on what looked like it could be a double off the bat of DH Tim Beckham. But David did pitch superbly and had excellent Red Sox defense behind him along with some timely hitting. David is so accurate and the Sox are so confident that he’ll be throwing strikes, that they’re ready to play defense every play. That’s always been the case with David. The teams he’s played on always play good defense when he throws because they know every pitch is going to be a strike or close to a strike. It’s a compliment to David and the Sox’ defense.

Hard throwing Matt Barnes came on in the bottom of the ninth, and had a little trouble giving up a two run homer to Evan “Longo” Longoria, but finished the game off with a K. He was throwing 96-97. Barnes has great stuff, he just needs to keep the ball down more and he’ll be very effective. The Sox starting pitching has been super the past month. If the bullpen can do its job, and Koji Uehara is throwing again and should be back in early September, which would really help in the set up role for closer Craig Kimbrel along with the other guys in the pen, then we’ve got a shot to do some great things in September and October.

David moved to 12-8 on the season and now has a 4.00 ERA. In his last two starts, he’s gone 14 innings and given up 6 hits, 1 run with 2 walks and 12 K’s. His WHIP is 0.50 and his ERA is 0.64 in those two outings. He pitched last Wednesday Night  in Baltimore and got the 8-1 victory in a rain shortened six inning game. But he gave up only four hits in that outing, allowing one run with 0 walks and four K’s. He’s been spectacular lately. David looks like the ace the Red Sox thought they were getting in December of 2015. He’s really pitched well this year for the most part, he’s just had a couple of tough outings. But he was super at Camden Yards last Wednesday, and super last night against the Rays. David came into last night’s game 0-3 at the Trop, so the Rays had given him a lot of trouble prior to last night’s gem.

The  Red Sox are playing stellar ball and are 6-2 on this road trip. Need to get the W tonight. Clay Bucholz, who’s been a stud in the past, and has come on for the BoSox lately as he’s gotten a chance to start due to some injuries, will get the ball tonight against talented but struggling right hander Chris Archer of the Rays. Archer is 7-16, but has great stuff and is dangerous. Clay, who went 6 last week against the Tigers and gave up 6 hits, only 1 run, walked none and K’d 3 against a stellar hitting lineup, has gotten John Farrell and the Red Sox’ confidence back, though he’ll need to follow it up tonight. Clay didn’t get the victory last Thursday against the Tigers because the bullpen couldn’t hold it and the Sox lost 4-3 after that red eye flight from Baltimore the night before. But the bullpen had no excuses. They just didn’t get the job done. So we need to finish this trip up strongly. Tonight would be a good follow up to the team’s performance last night if we can get the W. 

Here’s Benintendi’s catch below. Not only was it superb but it was also hugely clutch. Don’t worry about the language below the video. Thanks.