Sox look to leave 'pen games in rearview mirror despite decent performance

MINNEAPOLIS -- For the second time in just over 48 hours, Red Sox relievers carried the entire load during a game. Boston came up short in both games, including Saturday’s 3-1 loss to the Twins, but the bullpen was not to blame.

Manager Alex Cora cobbled together eight innings out of five relievers on Saturday, two days after getting nine innings out of five bullpen arms, including 4 1/3 innings from Josh Winckowski in Thursday’s 3-1 loss to the Giants.

Saturday’s game was a team effort in the sense that the workload was distributed more-or-less evenly over four arms after Brennan Bernardino pitched the first, allowing an unearned run after a passed ball led to a run scoring on a grounder.

He handed the ball to Greg Weissert, who went two scoreless frames on 29 pitches.

Next up was Cam Booser, who threw 22 pitches in 1 1/3 innings and gave up a solo homer to Max Kepler.

Justin Slaten came on in the middle of the fifth and stranded a runner on second base, but two wild pitches in the sixth cost him a run. Slaten finished with 29 pitches in 1 2/3 innings.

Finally, Chase Anderson came on and threw 35 pitches over two scoreless frames, though his outing was not without drama. He gave up a walk and a double to the first two batters he faced before buckling down and leaving both runners on base as he escaped the jam.

Add it up, and you’ve got a manager who’s happy with the way his relievers worked to stitch together a solid performance while the offense scuffled for the third straight game.

“We had a batter, wild pitch or passed ball and they score one right away,” Cora said, recalling the first inning. “[Kepler’s] homer, we’ll take it -- nobody on, it’s a good pitch, he put a good swing on it. And they scored one more.

“But overall, that’s why I’m OK. We’re going to pitch. And if we continue to do that, we know the offense is going to wake up, we’re going to score runs. It just happens that we lost the first two.”

Connor Wong caught all five relievers, just as he was behind the plate for Thursday’s five-pitcher game, but he didn’t think the challenge was all that different from the way he usually handles relievers.

“It's the same whether they come in late in the game or whenever that is,” Wong said. “It’s kind of the same plan for each of those guys. You try and execute their stuff. I thought they did a really nice job.”

Next week, the Sox have off days on either side of a two-game set in Atlanta that starts Tuesday. And starter Nick Pivetta is expected to return from the injured list to start on Wednesday. So while the bullpen games have generally worked out well, Cora is ready to put them in his rearview mirror.

“Hopefully it’s the last one,” he quipped after the game. “We’re going into tomorrow a little banged up, but Kenley [Jansen] is pitching tomorrow regardless, hopefully it’s the ninth. We’ve got Zack [Kelly], we’ve got [Bernardino], we’ve got [starter Cooper Criswell], and somebody else has to step up. Overall we threw the ball well.”