Red Sox Defeat Angels 5-4

The Boston Red Sox defeated the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim on Friday, July 1st 5-4. David Ortiz hit his 2000th hit with the Red Sox which coincidentally was his 522nd career home run, Brock Holt returned to the lineup and went 2-4 and threw out a runner at 2nd and Steven Wright pitched 5 scoreless innings before allowing a grand slam in the 6th inning in the pouring rain.

Ortiz's 2000 hit with the Red Sox went 3-4 and his homer in the 5th puts him 19th on the all-time homer list. He had been tied with Ted Williams, Frank Thomas and Willie McCovey at 521. The home run was also his 1,705th career RBI which puts him on the 23rd all-time list, breaking the tie with Frank Thomas. His 2,000th hit with the Red Sox puts him on the 7th all-time list.

In his return, Brock Holt went 2-4 with 2 doubles and a RBI. The Boiston Red Sox need to have Holt in the lineup as they are now 23-9 in games he starts!

Mookie Betts went 3-5 with a double, collecting 3 hits in a game for the 6th time this season. His lead-off double was his 7th lead-off hit in his last 14 games.

Steven Wright held the Angels scoreless for the first 5 innings before giving up ,a grand slam in the 6th inning in the pouring rain. The problem for Wright in very hot, sweaty weather (Texas) or last night, in the pouring rain,  is when his hands get wet he can't control the knuckler and then resorts to throwing a fastball when the batter expects it!  Wright ended up allowing 8 hits, striking out 3 and walking 3. He did pick up the win and is now 9-5

The Red Sox overcame an almost 2 hour rain delay as the game ended after midnight on Saturday morning. After Wright left, Matt Barnes, Junichi Tazawa, Koji Uehara and Craig Kimbrel each pitched a scoreless inning in relief, Kimbrel picked up his 17th save.

The Red Sox are now 43-36 on the season and with Baltimore losing to Seattle 5-2 are now 4 games out of 1st place. The Red Sox and Angels play the 2nd game of the series Saturday night, with the pregame starting at 6:30 with the 1st pitch at 7:15 on AM 1370 WDEA.