Neither the Blue Jays or the Red Sox are anywhere near elite status, but the first four games of this five-game series games certainly been entertaining.
And, given the baseball calendar, there’s nothing wrong with some high drama which played out on a Wednesday evening matchup dominated by stellar starting pitching.
Bryan Bello stole the spotlight in this one as the right-hander was simply superb in leading Boston to its 3-0 win, setting up Thursday’s series rubber match.
In eight complete innings, Bello gave up just two hits, but his team held only a 1-0 lead.
Then Canadian Tyler O’Neill, who has terrorized the Jays, went deep for a two-run blast in the bottom of the eighth to provide the Red Sox with some much-needed margin for error.
Neither of the Jays’ two hits were home runs — meaning their streak of going deep at least once in 16 consecutive games was over.
Outside of a spotty first inning, when he gave up his only run over 6.2 innings, Jays starter Chris Bassitt was every bit Bello’s equal. He allowed just five hits — three in the first inning — one walk and struck out nine.
In one stretch he retired 13 Bosox batters in a row.
Bassitt was lifted for Brandon Little with two outs and two on base in the seventh inning. Little needed two pitches to record the third out on a fly ball. But two batters into the eighth, and Little back on the bump, Boston had increased its lead by two, courtesy of the O’Neill dinger.
Bello also walked just one and struck out nine.
The only hits the Jays got off him were a second-inning double by Addison Barger and a single by Vlad Guerrero Jr., in the seventh.
Barger accounted for two of Toronto’s three base-runners with a fourth-inning walk.
Fenway Park has a history and habit of turning any game into a score-fest. But along comes the Bassitt-Bello matchup and neither team would muster much of anything, aside from the first inning that is.
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UNLUCKY 13
First innings have been Bassitt’s bugaboo this season and Wednesday was no exception.
It began with a Jarren Duran leadoff single. Bassitt got the next two Boston batters and appeared as if he might get out of it.
But then he plunked cleanup hitter Triston Casas — the 13th time Bassitt has hit a batter this season.
Wilyer Abreu’s hit into shallow left field was all the speedy Duran needed to score the game’s first run.
Masataka Yoshida then singled, but Casas stumbled as he rounded third, leaving the bases were loaded. But Bassitt escaped with no further damage by striking out Connor Wong.
AROUND THE BASES
Having ended the first on a strikeout, Bassitt struck out the first two batters he faced in the second inning. The second was Ceddanne Rafaela to record his 1,000th-career strikeout … Daulton Varsho entered Wednesday’s game on a 10-game hitting streak, along with another stretch of reaching base in 23 in a row. Both of those ended as well as the Jays outfield struck out three times before flying out to end the game in the ninth.