Red Sox starter Cooper Criswell tossed 4 perfect innings against the Tigers to open Sunday’s game. He struck out five and recorded four groundball outs.
The righty was at only 52 pitches but manager Alex Cora decided that was enough.
Cora replaced Criswell with lefty Rich Hill who allowed a two-run homer in the fifth inning that gave Detroit a 2-1 lead. The Red Sox lost 4-1 at Comerica Park to drop the three-game series, 2-1.
Red Sox' Cooper Criswell throws against the Tigers in the first inning Sunday. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)AP
“That’s how we drew it up,” Cora said about deciding to remove Criswell after 4 innings. “They had a bunch of lefties. He gave us enough and we went to Rich in that situation. We had a big pocket of lefties. Just the righty burned us.”
Detroit’s lineup had two left-handed hitters, Kerry Carpenter and Jace Jung, back-to-back to lead off the fifth.
Carpenter drew a 12-pitch walk. Hill struck out Jung swinging but then allowed a two-run homer to right-handed hitter Spencer Torkelson.
Detroit also had two other left-handed hitters, Zach McKinstry and Trey Sweeney, following Torkelson in the lineup. So it was a pocket with four of five hitters being left-handed.
“The hope was (for Criswell) to give us as many outs as possible and then we take advantage of the matchups,” Cora said. “It just didn’t work.”
Criswell’s dominance didn’t make Cora rethink the plan.
“He threw the ball well and Carpenter has been good against righties,” Cora said. “We had the lead. So we went to the lefty.”
The Red Sox had just taken the lead in the top of the fifth inning on three straight singles with two outs.
Pitch count was not an issue. In Criswell’s previous three outings, he had pitch counts of 72, 80 and 79.
“I think it was the lineup,” Cora said. “Like I said, we talk about it before the game. If we find a lane that it felt it makes sense to us — it was 4 (for Criswell), Rich goes 2 (innings) and then after that we go to the righties — we’ll do it. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. And today we got burned.”
The Red Sox went over the plan with Hill beforehand.
“They were definitely a few options throughout the lineup,” Hill said. “And that was one of them.”
Hill said the loss was his fault after he got ahead 0-2 against Carpenter before walking him on 12 pitches.
“Getting ahead the way that I did and then obviously the walk, it was just terrible,” Hill said. “The poorly executed curveball there to Torkelson. So this loss is on me. Just got to do better. That’s it. At the end of the day, make better pitches and put guys away when you’re ahead.”
Criswell’s ERA dropped to 4.14. He recorded three swings and misses with his sinker, which averaged 89.6 mph. He also induced two whiffs with his changeup and one with his cutter. He threw 35 of his 52 pitches for strikes.
Did Criswell want to continue pitching? Did he speak with Cora about the decision?
“Obviously you want to be out there,” Criswell said. “But I’m not going to say anything against him. Obviously I’d like to be out there but when we scored that run, he told me I was done for the day. So just kind of shook his hand and got a hug from him.”
