Boston Red Sox: Why return to Fenway will right the ship
By Justin Keene
Going 3-8 on the season opening west coast road trip, the Boston Red Sox return home Tuesday; looking to turn things around at Fenway Park.
The start to the 2019 MLB season has been absolutely terrible. The Boston Red Sox have been outscored 72-46 and have lost all but three games in their first 11 of 2019. Not the way you wanted to start a title defense season.
Tuesday, it’s a new start. The 2018 World Series Champs will get their rings before the Fenway faithful and then start a six game home-stand that features the Toronto Blue Jays and the Baltimore Orioles. Now, with those caliber opponents, the Red Sox should be able to rebound from their ugly and disappointing start.
Opening Day also marks the third turn on the starting rotation. The starters have been the most concerning, as they have a combined ERA of 8.57. That is something that you do not want to see, ever.
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There are many things that could account for the slow start for the pitching staff. One of which is the fact that with the extra month added on to the season, the arms were overworked and strained heading into Spring Training.
We all know the case with Chris Sale‘s arm down the stretch last year. Since the arms were overworked, Alex Cora wanted to take it easy on his starting pitchers in Spring Training. Clearly, the rotation was not ready for the start of 2019, but after 3-4 times around on the rotation, you would think that the arms would be in better shape.
In 2018, the Boston Red Sox were 57-24 at home, posting a .704 winning percentage and outscoring opponents 468-322 in the process. The Red Sox are a different team at Fenway. In the playoffs, they went 4-2 at home, going 1-1 against the Yankees, 1-1 against the Astros and 2-0 vs the Dodgers.
As terrible as the Boston Red Sox have been this season, you can blame it on the Championship hangover, not being fully prepared, or the long road trip to open up the season.
The Blue Jays and Orioles have also been bad, as they are expected to be battling each other all season long in order to avoid finishing in the basement of the AL East. Toronto just came off a 4 game sweep at the hands of the Cleveland Indians, dropping their record to 3-8, being outscored by opponents 34-29. Baltimore is 4-5, coming off a 3 game sweep by the Yankees at Camden Yards and have been outscored 55-36.
Chris Sale toes the rubber for his third start of 2019. Sale brings an 0-2 record, with an 8.00 ERA in 9 innings across 2 starts. Toronto counters with Matt Shoemaker. The righty is 2-0 with a 0.00 ERA across 14 innings in 2 starts.
Boston Red Sox: 3 way too early predictions for 2019 season. dark. Next
First pitch is at 2:00 PM and the ring ceremony is rumored to start around 1:00 PM. The game a pre game ceremonies can be found on both ESPN and NESN.
Hopefully the Boston Red Sox can feed off the crowd and start their home-stand 1-0.
Go Sox.