Chris Sale Is The Real Motherfuckin' Deal, Dominates Over Seven Scoreless In Red Sox Walk-Off Win
Serious question — When is the last time that the Red Sox unveiled an incredibly hyped player who then lived up to that hype immediately?
It wasn’t David Price, Craig Kimbrel, Carl Crawford, Adrian Gonzalez, Pablo Sandoval, Hanley Ramirez, or Josh Beckett. I think you’d have to go all the way back to Curt Schilling in 2004 to find the last high profile Red Sox acquisition who came to Boston with a prior reputation of success and then continued it immediately upon putting on a Red Sox uniform. That was 13 years ago.
Now, that’s not to say that one start is all we need to see from Chris Sale to prove that he’s officially the shining example of a superstar who can come to Boston and be, in year-one, what they’ve always been throughout their career. But, didn’t it feel like it last night? It was almost cold enough to snow; you had infielders bundled up like they were about to climb Mount Everest, and this motherfucker was out there in short sleeves, hitting as high as 98.15 MPH on the gun.
After he got Francisco Cervelli to fly out to center to cap off his seventh and final scoreless inning of work, he walked back to the dugout screaming at himself for walking David Freese one batter prior, all while getting his first standing ovation from the Fenway Faithful that he didn’t even notice because he was too busy reprimanding himself for putting a runner on base that didn’t even advance past first. This is the same guy who was punching himself in the head for not covering first base in time during a spring training game this year. The man is a psychopath, and he was born to pitch in Boston.
I wrote yesterday that we haven’t had a must-see pitcher in Boston since Pedro Martinez. We have one now. This is the guy who you circle all of their starts on the calendar for. He’s special. Last night, I watched Sale strike out Starling Marte swinging on a pitch that bounced in the batter’s box that he was standing in. After I tweeted the photo (no more videos, RIP Vine), I got several tweets from White Sox fans being like, yeah, he does that. Like, a lot. It’s a regular occurrence.
It’s a shame that the Red Sox couldn’t muster any runs for the guy, who received a no-decision in his first start after going seven shutout innings, issuing just the one walk to seven strikeouts, allowing just three hits. You know who else pitched seven innings, allowed three hits and no runs in their first start with the Red Sox? Pedro Martinez. Just sayin’. Also, I thought it was pretty cool that Sale wanted to keep his Red Sox jersey from last night as a memento.
After Sale exited the game, the Red Sox still had a long way to go before they could claim victory. As great as Sale was, 25-year-old Jameson Taillon matched him goose egg for goose egg. And that Red Sox bullpen that everyone was worried about with Tyler Thornburg on the disabled list to start the year and Carson Smith still battling his way back from Tommy surgery? They picked right back up where they left off last September when the Red Sox bullpen combined for a 1.77 ERA, 1.15 WHIP and 10.73 K/9. Last night, Matt Barnes (1.0), Craig Kimbrel (1.0), Heath Hembree (0.2), Robby Scott (0.1), and Joe Kelly (2.0) combined for five innings of shutout ball, allowing just two hits and no walks. LOVE to see no walks from these guys.
Any time you get shut out through 11 innings, there aren’t going to be many guys to highlight offensively, but there were a couple of things that stood out to me. First, Pablo Sandoval — here we fuckin’ go again with the switch hitter who can’t switch hit. Please, for the love of GOD, give up hitting from the right side. In 2015, Sandoval tried hitting left-handed pitching as a left-handed hitter and he hit .266 with a .744 OPS after going 2-for-41 against left-handed pitching from the right side.
Last night, he looked like dog shit hitting from the right side. I don’t understand why he’s so adamant about doing something that he’s so bad at when he could actually be pretty decent at it if he chose to. Also, he made another error, so that’s two errors in two games. And it’s definitely in his head, not wanting to get booed at home, because after he got booed for the second error, he bobbled a ball later in the game before making the throw over to first in time. Definitely in his head.
Second thing — Mitch Moreland, not a great introduction to Red Sox fans punching out three times in his second game last night, BUT…he did sting two balls to the wall that more than likely would’ve been homers on a summer night. I don’t think he’s going to be winning a batting title any time soon, but he’s going to hit his fair share of dingers and doubles this year.
And finally, Sandy Leon. I wrote about this last night after the game, but I’ll echo the same sentiments here. Why is there all this talk about Christian Vazquez taking over behind the plate, as if some sort of changing of the guard is inevitable? Do people realize that Leon is only 28 years old? Do people also realize that Vazquez is going to be 27 this summer? Leon is less than a year and a half older than Vazquez, is clearly the better hitter, and is an above average defender behind the plate. He might not be better than Vazquez defensively, but he’s certainly better than most.
Hitting out of the ninth spot in the order, Leon collected three more hits last night — a single, a double and a three-run bomb that ended the game.
Sucks, but today’s series finale against the Pirates has already been postponed due to rain. They’ll get this one in a week from today at 2:05 PM.
PS — For all you Section 10 listeners, as promised, we’re moving to two episodes a week now that the season is underway. We’ll be dropping new episodes every Monday and Friday, so this week’s episode will be out tomorrow, and then next week is when you’ll get your two episodes through the end of the postseason. Subscribe on iTunes. #LFHI
Final score: Red Sox 3, Pirates 0