The Boston Red Sox won one of the wildest games of the season on Friday night, topping the Baltimore Orioles 12-10 at Camden Yards.
Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Cooper Criswell (64) delivers a pitch in the fifth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on July 23. Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
With the win, the Sox remain 2.5 games back of the Kansas City Royals in the American League wild card picture. Boston's offense came to life in this one, with the team registering 14 hits and four different multi-run innings. Five different players had multi-hit games for Boston, who is now 64-57 on the year.
And it's a good thing that the Sox offense came to play, because the Sox pitching certainly struggled. Boston allowed a whopping 17 hits in addition to the 10 runs. They also allowed six walks in the contest.
The Sox hadn't won a game like this in nearly the last 30 years of team history, according to @JayHayKid of the "Baseball is Dead" podcast:
Even more specific: the last time Boston won while allowing 17+ hits *and* issuing at least 6 walks in a 9-inning game (prior to tonight) was 1996.
The Red Sox and Orioles will play again on Saturday night with first pitch coming at 7:05 p.m. ET. Sox' righty Bryan Bello will get the ball against lefty Code Povich.
Bello is 10-5 with a 4.97 ERA, though his ERA has continued to drop over the last few weeks. The young pitcher is supposed to be the centerpiece of what the Sox do in the rotation in the coming years. Povich is 1-5 this year with a 6.27 ERA. This will be his ninth career big-league game.
