Reds 5, Red Sox 2: Errors and strikeouts interrupt Boston’s winning streak

Tonight, the Red Sox made three errors in one inning, failed to hit with runners in scoring position, and struck out 14 times. They were bad!

Still, there was actually a pretty long stretch of the game where it felt like they might somehow pull it off. By the bottom of the seventh inning, Cutter Crawford had shut out ten Reds in a row after allowing three solo home runs to start, keeping the score at a slim 3-2. Then the avalanche of errors started!

Enmanuel Valdez, who continues to prove he’s a major liability defensively at second base, broke Crawford’s streak of retiring batters when he made an error early in the seventh inning. Then, after allowing a one-out double later, Crawford’s night was over, leading to this chaos:

Amazingly, just minutes after that botched play, Cooper Criswell (remember him?) and the Woo Sox were able to make a similar play and get out of trouble.

In a complete reflection of luck, they were leading their game 5-2 when the last out was recorded in Cincinnati. (They later won 6-2.)

Anyway, it was not to be for the big club tonight. They made another mistake later in the seventh period when Rafael Devers couldn’t complete that play and instead committed his fifth mistake of the season.

On offense, the Red Sox got 10 of their 14 strikeouts against Cincinnati starter Andrew Abbott, which brings us to the unusual composition of the Reds’ roster.

As of tonight, Baseball Reference had only five players with a WAR above 1.0:

Hunter Green: 2.9

Nick Lodolo: 2.3

Andrew Abbott: 2.2 (This value will increase after tonight’s game)

Elly De La Cruz: 2.1

Tyler Stephenson: 1.1

The best three of those five are members of their rotation. So the Reds are one of those teams that are much harder to play against depending on what part of the rotation you’re facing. While that’s technically true for any team, it’s especially true for them because if you don’t have one of those top three players on the mound for the first 60 percent of the game, the rest of the roster is pretty easy to handle.

The good news is that the Red Sox won’t face any of those three starters tomorrow. The bad news is that the Reds announced today that they are skipping Nick Lodolo’s spot in the rotation and he is now scheduled to start on Sunday. This is the same day that the Red Sox are taking Tanner Houck out of their rotation and opting for a bullpen day.

In other words, you should attend the Saturday event instead!

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Only two guys scored a run for the Sox tonight. Only two guys had multiple hits for the Sox tonight. Those same two guys also hit solo home runs. Here they are:

Unexploded bombs

Take your pick, but these three stood out:

Rafael Devers for going 0-4 with three strikeouts and making one error.

Masataka Yoshida, for his 0:4 and a WPA of -.114.

Cam Booser for not making the play on that bunt. It was tough and a really difficult situation, but that was the moment the game got out of control.