The Red Sox exploded for nine runs in the late innings of Game 4 of the World Series, but it wasn’t because of the players you would expect.
The Boston Red Sox are one win away from winning their ninth World Series championship in franchise history, but it’s not because of the superstar hitters they have in their lineup.
Just one day after losing the longest game in World Series history — an 18-inning affair in Game 3 that the Los Angeles Dodgers won with a walk off homer by Max Muncy — the Red Sox defeated the Dodgers 9-6 in Game 4 to take a commanding 3-1 lead in the World Series, and they did it behind the bats of a few of their unsung heroes.
It wasn’t Mookie Betts or J.D. Martinez — both of whom are hitless since the series shifted to Dodger Stadium — that delivered the clutch RBIs. After Rich Hill kept the Red Sox scoreless for six innings, and Yasiel Puig hit a three-run bomb in the sixth to stretch LA’s lead to 4-0, it was Mitch Moreland who first put the Red Sox on the board with a three-run blast of his own.
Moreland’s homer was hit so hard that he may have busted the skin off the ball, and it gave the Boston offense a rush of momentum it had been sorely missing since it left Fenway Park. Now trailing 4-3 in the eighth, another unsung hero — Steve Pearce, who grew up a Red Sox fan and was acquired by them midseason — drilled a solo homer to knot the game up at 4-4.
And that was only the beginning of it. In the top of the ninth, Brock Holt, usually a reserve infielder, reached base with a one-out double, and then 21-year-old Rafael Devers drove him home with an RBI single to give the Red Sox their first lead of the game. Now up by one, Boston eventually loaded the bases, and Pearce returned to the plate and belted a three-run double to put the game out of reach.
The Red Sox getting clutch hits from these guys pretty much sums up Boston sports in a nutshell. The city of Boston has won 10 championships since 2001 — divided between the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics and Bruins — and when these teams win championships, usually the players that not many people know about are just as much a part of the story as the superstar players.
In the case of Game 4, the unknown players were the ENTIRE story. It wasn’t the soon-to-be American League MVP Mookie Betts, or the league RBI leader J.D. Martinez, that put the Red Sox in position to close out the 2018 World Series. It was Mitch Moreland, Brock Holt, Rafael Devers and Steve Pearce.
Look them up if you’ve never heard of them.