Red Sox Grades

This game was just a complete failure for the Red Sox. Right after getting arguably their best win of the season they endured their worst loss of the season. The umpires mercifully called off the game in the 7th because of the rain, but this game was over long before the end of the 7th. Alfredo Aceves had a complete meltdown. In his major league debut, Steven Wright didn't help matters on mop up duty once Aceves was pulled from the game. To top it all off the Red Sox managed only 3 hits in 7 innings on Bartolo Colon. I'm astounded Bartolo Colon is still pitching in the majors. I remember he made some starts for the Red Sox back in 2008 when he was considered washed up. Apparently, Colon is still bouncing around the league and he's currently 3-0 this season in 4 starts. Hopefully the Red Sox can move past this with Jon Lester on the mound tonight.

We all knew that Alfredo Aceves wasn't supposed to be a major league starter, but he had chugged along making some spot starts with John Lackey injured and finally we got burned by him. He had a complete meltdown in the 3rd inning that carried over to the 4th when they were hoping Aceves could at least eat some innings and preserve the bullpen. The third inning looked like a lowlight reel that should have had the Benny Hill music going in the background.

All totaled the third inning had 3 walks, 3 hits, 6 runs, 2 throwing errors and 2 balks. This was profoundly bad. They sent Aceves back out in the 4th in the hopes of preserving the bullpen, but he quickly gave up a 1 out, two-run home run at which point he was mercifully pulled from the game. There's a lot of buzz going around that they're going to release Aceves today and I wouldn't complain if they did.
STARTING PITCHING GRADE: F

Steven Wright was brought in on mop up duty and didn't fare much better than Aceves in his major league debut. He induced a double play to get out of the 4th, but gave up a bunch of walks and hits in the 5th to give up another 4 runs. He walked two more batters to start the 6th and got hit up for another run on a double to create the final tally of 13-0. At least he managed to get out of a 2nd and 3rd with nobody out jam and didn't give up any more runs in the 7th. After the 7th the umpires did everybody a favor and called this game.
BULLPEN GRADE: F

As bad as the pitching was, you won't win many ball games if you don't score any runs and that's exactly what the Red Sox did. Pedroia, Salty and Gomes all managed a single and Ellsbury worked a walk. That accounts for all 4 Red Sox baserunners this game. Pathetic.
HITTING GRADE: F