Multiple-run innings in the fourth and fifth gave Boston a 7-3 victory.
MIAMI -- Something resembling an offensive breakout finally gave the Red Sox pitching staff welcome breathing room Monday night.
Boston huffed, puffed and finally blew the house down against Miami, extending its dominance in interleague play as the scheduling format begins its third decade.
Multiple-run innings in the fourth and fifth made life easy for Brian Johnson and the bullpen, as Boston captured its fourth straight with a 7-3 victory at Marlins Park.
Christian Vazquez knocked a two-run double to highlight the fourth and Hanley Ramirez sent a two-run homer into the Miami bullpen to account for the scoring in the fifth, as the Red Sox finally found something resembling comfort in the batter’s box. Mookie Betts added a solo homer in the sixth, another rocket to left field, and Rafael Devers lined an RBI double to right center in the ninth to complete Boston’s highest scoring output of the season.
“Like I said yesterday, we hit some balls hard,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said. “It was just a matter of time.”
Only on Opening Day had Boston plated more runs in a full game than it piled up in the top of the fourth alone on Monday. Eduardo Nunez grounded an RBI double to the corner in left, Jackie Bradley Jr. walked and Vazquez lined a two-run double off the glove of Miami third baseman Brian Anderson, making it 3-1.
Boston was at it again with one out in the fifth, this time thanks to the long ball. Andrew Benintendi rolled an infield hit to the right side and Ramirez pounced on a hanging slider from Trevor Richards, cranking it to deep left. It was the last of five earned runs allowed by the right-hander in his major league debut, as Richards was tagged with the loss.
“Don’t try to think too much,” Ramirez said. “Go out there, do your job and have fun.”
Johnson made it a full turn through the Red Sox rotation of strong starts, allowing just a solo homer to right from Anderson through six innings. Johnson used a fielder’s choice to strand a pair in the third and got Bryan Holaday to ground into a 4-6-3 double play ending the fourth, the two closest shaves he endured otherwise. Johnson made it 30 innings worked by Boston starters to date, with the group’s collective earned-run average sitting at a stingy 0.90.
“Everyone feeds off each other,” Johnson said. “It was huge. You see one guy go out there and do well, you want to repeat that.”
“This is what we expected,” Cora said. “We know how special they can be. We know the first three guys, but the next two, they were outstanding these last two games.”
And unlike the previous three one-run victories at Tampa Bay, the Red Sox bullpen combined for nine relatively low-stress outs to finish it off. Heath Hembree worked around a one-out single in the seventh and Marcus Walden grinded through the final two innings to give most of his mates a much-needed night off. An RBI single by Cameron Maybin and a run-scoring groundout from Starlin Castro – his 500th career RBI – couldn’t prevent the majority of Boston’s full arsenal from being available for Tuesday night’s road trip finale.
“We needed (Johnson) to go deep in the game,” Cora said. “We thought we had 27 outs with the bullpen but, as you saw, we had to maneuver it.”
The Red Sox improve to 228-156 all-time against interleague opposition, including a 23-12 mark against the Marlins. It’s the first of 20 games Boston will play against National League East foes this season.