On Monday night, the Boston Red Sox suffered their worst defeat of the season, falling 16-1 in the first game of the series against the Tampa Bay Rays.
The Rays piled on five runs through the first two innings, and a disastrous third inning saw Tampa Bay score nine runs, making the score 14-1 after three frames and ultimately putting the game out of reach from the start.
Boston's starter in the game, Tanner Houck, had a nightmarish start. The 28-year-old's final pitching line is one of the worst that Red Sox fans have ever seen. Houck only managed to get through 2.1 innings, allowing 10 hits, 11 earned runs, and walking two Rays batters on 61 pitches thrown.
The brutal performance against the AL East foe brings Houck's record to 0-2 with a 9.16 ERA this season.
In a cruel form of deja vu, Houck had a similar performance against the Rays not even one month ago. In his March 22nd Spring Training start against the Rays, Houck went 3.2 innings, allowing 12 hits and 10 earned runs and walking two Rays batters.
To make matters worse for Houck, it's not like his start against the Rays was an outlier. Through four starts, the only outlier was the one game he pitched well, against the Blue Jays on April 9th. Houck went a respectable 6.2 innings, allowing five hits and one earned run as the Red Sox fell 2-1 in extra innings.
His first two starts of the season didn't show much promise, either. Houck allowed a combined 12 hits and 7 earned runs through 9.2 innings against the Rangers and Orioles.
After last night's game, Houck briefly spoke on his struggles after the worst outing of his six-year career.
"Just not good... Come back tomorrow, figure it out...I'm not going to overanalyze it tonight."Tanner Houck
The frustrations continue to pile on for Houck, and rightfully so, after he was named an All-Star with a 3.12 ERA in 30 starts last season. Every player has their own struggles at the beginning of a new season, but Houck's performances to date have Red Sox fans questioning if he is the same pitcher.
Manager Cora addressed how Houck's pitches were easily hittable and found the middle of the zone throughout his whole start, but the poor defense behind him didn't help either. Boston leads the league in errors with 20.
"If you look at the balls they hit hard, they were in the middle of the plate... Of course there were some balls that went by. We didn’t play good defense behind him. So I don’t know. Just good approach. And they put some good swings on him"Alex Cora
With the banged-up rotation to start the season, the Red Sox need to get better performances out of their top-end arms like Houck and Buehler in order to stay afloat in the AL East. The offense has issues of its own, and last night's crushing defeat may have marked a low point for the club to begin the season.
The Red Sox will look for Walker Buehler to get back on track in Tuesday night's matchup against Tampa, in a game that should be closer than last night's mess.