PAWTUCKET, R.I. – First, the good news.
The Pawtucket Red Sox turned their first triple play since June 26, 2009 in the eighth inning of Monday night’s game against the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders.
Now, the bad news.
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Pawtucket’s usually reliable bullpen imploded which enabled the RailRiders to rally for a 5-3 victory in 10 innings.
The PawSox broke a 1-1 tie in the seventh inning with a combination of timely hitting and even more timely base stealing.
Garin Cecchini led with a single, stole second base and advanced to third on Corey Brown’s single.
Cecchini scored on a wild pitch by Mark Montgomery which advanced Brown to second.
Brown then stole third and scored on Ryan Roberts single for a 3-1 lead.
That rally went for naught in the eight when Drake Britton, who’s rated as Boston’s 17th-best prospect by Baseball America, coughed up that two-run lead.
Jose Pirela led with a single and Adonis Garcia crushed a two-run homer into the left-field berm which tied the game at 3-3.
Britton then walked Ramon Flores and Kyle Roller which gave the RailRiders an opportunity for an even bigger inning.
But Zelous Wheeler hit a sharp ground to third. Cecchini stepped on the bag for one out, threw to Roberts for the second and Roberts’ throw easily beat Wheeler for the triple play.
Now, flash forward to the 10th with Chris Hernandez on in relief of Britton.
Pirela beat out an infield hit, Garcia walked and Flores lined an RBI single.
Roller capped the scoring with a sacrifice fly to left.
Pawtucket didn’t come within sniffing distance of a rally because SWB relievers Jim Miller and Diego Moreno combined to strikeout four of six PawSox over the last two innings.
Among other things, the loss offset a commendable performance by starter Allen Webster who allowed one run on three hits over the five innings he worked.