Tanner Houck pitched five scoreless innings, and Wilyer Abreu reached base three times as the Boston Red Sox won 4-1 against the Toronto Blue Jays on Monday night, extending their winning streak to three games.
This game marked the start of Boston’s final road trip, a three-game series in Toronto, and they improved to 4-0 in Canada this season.
The Red Sox used 10 walks and five hits to achieve their 79th win, having finished the last two seasons with records of 78-84.
“We needed to be relentless in the strike zone and we were,” said manager Alex Cora. “Guys did an amazing job working counts, taking their walks.”
Abreu walked and scored on Vaughn Grissom’s sacrifice fly in the second inning. He hit an RBI double in the third and added a single in the fifth, becoming one of the only two Boston players with multiple hits, along with Jarren Duran.
Houck (9-10) carried a perfect game into the fifth inning before walking Addison Barger with two outs.
Ernie Clement then got a single, but Houck forced Jonatan Clase to fly out. He threw just 57 pitches, with 36 strikes, in his first winning start since July 11 against Oakland.
“Felt good with everything, felt in sync with the body, felt strong,” Houck said. “I just went out there, trusted the defense, and pounded the zone the whole night. It kind of felt like I had command over all the pitches.”
Houck made his 30th start of the season, achieving this milestone for the first time.
“As a starter, that’s kind of what you strive for,” he said.
In the sixth inning, Leo Jiménez and George Springer hit back-to-back singles off Greg Weissert for Toronto, but Nathan Lukes grounded into a double play, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. grounded out to end the inning.
Guerrero went 0 for 4, which caused his batting average to drop to .324.
Boston left-hander Zach Penrod got two outs in the seventh inning, while right-hander Luis Guerrero pitched 1 1/3 innings before righty Chris Martin worked around Spencer Horwitz’s RBI single in the ninth.
