Red Sox 2, Astros 1: Roman reigns supreme

Clearly, these dudes are fired up about Cooper Criswell’s return to the active roster.

Craig Breslow sat on his ass on Thursday, but Cooper Criswell sure didn’t. Nor did Roman Anthony, who collected his first career walk-off hit to make it four walk-offs in the magical City Connects. I guess the magic persists even if you mix in a little blue (get it, because the jerseys are green now and they used to be yellow).

As a proud OG Big Crisp™ stan, I feel very proud to be writing this recap after he basically single-handedly kept the Red Sox in the game for seven innings (okay, some nice defense helped as well). I’m a proud witness of his only other career start in which he went at least seven innings, and tonight’s performance was almost a duplicate of his outing at Coors.

7/23/2024: 7 IP, 6 H, 0 ER, BB, 4 K

8/01/2025: 7 IP, 7 H, ER, 2 BB, 4 K

While those aren’t box scores of dominance, there’s just something about a pitcher who can allow an unnervingly high number of hits while also keeping the opponents off the board, and I’m good with that every night. Criswell’s only blemish of the outing was Christian Walker’s solo home run in the second inning, but he didn’t let that get him down — so good for him!

Unfortunately for Boston, Houston’s starter, Hunter Brown, was just as sharp, and even more so from a box score perspective, as he threw 6.1 innings of shutout ball. But Masataka Yoshida made himself useful for the first time in a bit by drawing a HBP to start the seventh and was eventually driven in by Wilyer Abreu via sacrifice fly to get Boston evened up heading into the final two innings. Abreu had the chance to extend his heroism on the night as he came up to the plate with two runners on and two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but after a few close call foul balls, ended up striking out to bring us some free baseball after the off day.

Astros rookie Cam Smith, a key piece in the Kyle Tucker trade over the offseason, started the 10th with a productive at bat, hitting a hard line drive to advance the ghost runner to third with only one out. Trevor Story saved the day after a ninth inning double with a solid throw home on a groundball from Mauricio Dubon, and while it wasn’t necessarily anything impressive, was still impressively fundamental.

Ceddanne Rafaela started Boston’s half of the 10th with his own form of productivity, as Abreu ran out the throw at third on Rafaela’s swinging bunt, putting runners on the corner with no outs. This set up our glorious king Roman Anthony for his first career walk-off, as he put together an impressive at bat after falling behind 0-2 and laying off a pair of sliders before getting a fastball down the middle which he drove over the head of Chas McCormick in centerfield. What a beautiful way to end a roller coaster of a week, and what a beautiful reminder that, even when we may be pissed at the leadership of the team, baseball is still awesome.

Three studs

Cooper Criswell

As I said before, I’ll take a 7 inning, 7 hit, 1 ER start any day of the week, and it’s even more impressive coming from someone who hasn’t pitched in the majors in nearly a month with another month-long break coming before that.

Roman Anthony

He’s great at baseball, puts together at bats that children should be forced to watch while learning how to hit, and loves the city of Boston, what more could you ask for?

Wilyer Abreu/Trevor Story

Abreu’s ninth inning strikeout was a bit devastating, but hey, he did have one of just two RBIs on the night after all. Story started that rally in the ninth and made a quick decision in the 10th to keep the Astros off the board, so they can share these honors for a pair of solid performances in a non-eye-popping game.

Three duds

Although it was a low-scoring game, no one quite turned in a dud-ish performance tonight outside of a slumping Abraham Toro and Rafaela, who went 0-for-4 but was key in the 10th. Jarren Duran struck out twice but did something good in the outfield (shocking), Yoshida only hit into one groundball out (yay!), and Narvaez had an impressive back pick to get him in some good graces.

Play of the game

It has to be the walk-off, of course! And an impressively good interview afterward on national (?) television coming from a 21-year-old.