ANAHEIM -- A bullpen game the day after a 15-inning marathon didn’t sound like a recipe for success for the Red Sox.

Sure enough, things didn’t work out for Boston on Saturday night at Angel Stadium, as Ryan Brasier couldn’t hold a one-run lead in the eighth and the Red Sox fell to the Angels, 10-4.

• Box score

“It wasn’t a horrible game, it was just one bad inning,” manager Alex Cora said. “We had bases loaded with one out [in the top of the eighth] with the chance to add on. It doesn’t happen. They came back and they scored seven. Up ‘til there, we felt good. We had good at-bats, we played the game right, it just didn’t happen.”

Eight pitchers were required to get through 11 innings on Friday. Four of them pitched on Saturday, including Brasier. Coming off that 20-pitch outing, Brasier was knocked around in his two-thirds of an inning, getting tagged for five earned runs on five hits and an intentional walk in a seven-run inning for the Halos.

“Ball just kind of falling back to the middle of the plate,” Brasier said of what went wrong. “I made a couple good pitches that got slapped off for singles, and they just fell today.”

Brian Goodwin’s two-run single brought Brasier’s night to a close, as he was lifted for Josh A. Smith, who deepened the deficit by allowing a three-run homer to Albert Pujols.

Prior to Friday and Saturday, Brasier had pitched on back-to-back days 18 times in 2019. In those games, he’s allowed nine earned runs in 16 1/3 innings (4.96 ERA), with a .281 batting average and a .813 OPS allowed. On one or more days of rest, he has a 3.48 ERA (12 earned runs in 31 innings).

“It’s our job,” said Brasier, about pitching on consecutive days when needed. “It’s my job to get ready to go and go out there and perform, and tonight, I didn’t get the job done.”

Overall, it’s been a taxing couple of games for Red Sox relievers, who threw a combined 337 pitches between Friday and Saturday. The bright side is that the timing is as good as any in the season, with big league rosters expanding on Sunday and the reinforcements coming in the form of three yet-to-be-named pitchers. The Red Sox also have a day off on Monday to further refresh.

The A’s lost and the Rays won on Saturday, so those teams are currently tied for the second American League Wild Card spot, while the Red Sox are 5 1/2 games back, having missed the chance to pick up a game in that hunt.

“The up and down? That’s part of it,” said Cora. “Pitch by pitch, inning by inning, play by play, that’s the beauty of trying to make it to the playoffs. Tomorrow, we’ll show up and see where we’re at, and we’ll go after it.”