In a rematch of their April 17th contest at Fenway Park, where Boston’s Tanner Houck outperformed Cleveland’s Ben Lively in a 2-0 Red Sox victory, Lively sought redemption on Tuesday night. Despite missing the opening weeks of his Cleveland tenure due to a viral illness, Lively delivered a strong outing, allowing only one run on four hits and striking out seven over 6 1/3 innings. The lone blemish on Lively’s record came in the seventh inning when Wilyer Abreu connected for a solo home run.
Lively’s performance was overshadowed by the heroics of Will Brennan in the bottom of the seventh. With the game tied 1-1, Brennan led off with a double into the right-center field gap. Tyler Freeman followed with a single to score Brennan and give the Guardians the lead for good.
Tanner Houck, who tossed a three-hit complete game against the Guardians last week, was nearly as dominant on Tuesday. However, he was unable to escape the seventh inning after allowing a leadoff double to Brennan. Houck walked Estevan Florial to load the bases and was charged with two more runs when Brennan Bernardino entered and walked David Fry and Brayan Rocchio hit a sacrifice fly.
Jose Ramirez’s opposite-field homer to right and Florial’s RBI double in the eighth provided insurance for the Guardians, who have now won eight of their last nine games and improved to an MLB-best 17-6.
Meanwhile, the Red Sox, despite being plagued by injuries, remain two games above .500 and are coming off a three-game series sweep of Pittsburgh. However, they managed just six hits in the opener of this three-game set.
Rob Refsnyder had three hits for the Red Sox, who broke the scoreless tie in the seventh inning with Abreu’s solo homer. However, the Guardians were finally able to get to Houck in the bottom of that frame.
Cleveland’s Scott Barlow earned the win and Emmanuel Clase struck out the side in the ninth for his seventh save.
