Boston Red Sox: Chris Sale’s improvisation on the mound dominates O’s

In the heat of a wild card race destined to go down to the wire, Boston Red Sox ace Chris Sale used a combination of power and finesse to hand the Baltimore Orioles there 100th loss of the season and most importantly keep his team locked into a playoff spot.

After surrounding a solo homer off the bat of Austin Hays, the lanky lefty didn’t let his bout with COVID-19 hold him down or hold him back on the mound as he went on to lead the Red Sox to a 7-1 victory over the Orioles.

With the performance and victory, Sale is now 4-0 with a 2.40 ERA since returning from Tommy John Surgery and now COVID.  Talk about getting it down, this wasn’t the flame throwing version of Sale.  No, he adjusted on the mound and found other ways to get the Orioles out.

He did it mostly with a combination of sliders, fastballs and changeups that had Baltimore batters grounding out the entire night.  Check out this nasty slider:

Boston Red Sox ace Chris Sale’s improvisation on the mound another sign of dominance

In pitching five innings of one-run baseball, Sale’s focus prior to stepping on the mound was to just get it done in any way possible as its crunch time for the Boston Red Sox.

"“I just think that this was just kind of how the game played out. I know you guys were watching, obviously, and my fastball wasn’t really jumping out of my hand tonight,” Sale said following the game, via MLB.com. “So, I really had to just rely on my secondary pitches, my slider, my changeup. I was leaning on my defense to make some plays, and they did that. I think it was just kind of how the game played out.”"

Now tied in the loss column with the New York Yankees and Toronto Blue Jays every one of the remaining 13 games are going to count and the Red Sox simply must take advantage of playing most of those games at home and playing against a team like the Orioles.

While Sale got it done on the mound and found a “new way to amaze” Red Sox manager Alex Cora, the offense did their thing behind the hot bat of Bobby Dalbec who put the team up 3-1 with a solo blast in the 4th inning and a bases loaded double off the bat of Hunter Renfroe in the 6th inning that put the game away.

But, back to Chris Sale.  The most impressive part of his outing is that he was ready.  After missing his last start due to COVID, the Red Sox ace kept himself ready by staying on schedule.  He found ways to pitch and exercise from the comfort of his own backyard and stayed mentally prepared and it showed even with him having the arm strength and velocity that makes Sale that dominant presence on the mound.

"“He pitched well,” Cora said of Sale’s preparation while away from the team for 10 days. “The slider is a lot better than his first few outings. The velocity wasn’t there, but we talked a little bit — it’s hard to get it going, those 10 days, trying to do it by yourself, doing everything in the yard, he even had that fake mound. Just throwing into a net, it’s not the same.”"

Although the Boston Red Sox didn’t do much at the MLB Trade Deadline, it appears their biggest acquisition in the starting rotation is the player they were banking on.  Since his return, Sale has been that stopper on the mound and the injection of energy the team needs, especially going down the stretch.