It was a rough showing for the Boston Red Sox bullpen as they fell to the Tampa Bay Rays on Thursday night.
BOSTON -- The Boston Red Sox fell to 16-22 on the season when the Tampa Bay Rays snapped their three-game winning streak on Thursday night with an 8-4 win at Fenway Park. It was an unusually shaky night for the Boston bullpen, which entered the night as one of the best in baseball.
Rookie lefty Jake Bennett got the start for Boston as they kicked off a seven-game homestand riding the momentum from their first sweep of the 2026 season in Detroit. After breezing through the first inning, Bennett ran into trouble in the second, allowing three runs on three hits to give the Rays a 3-0 lead. The Boston offense quickly responded with three of their own in the bottom of the second to even things up at 3-3.
Bennett settled down nicely, retiring nine of the next 10 Tampa hitters into the sixth inning. After allowing a leadoff double to Rays star third baseman Junior Caminero, Bennett struck out Tampa first baseman Jonathan Aranda for the first out of the sixth before interim manager Chad Tracy turned to Greg Weissert to finish off the inning.
Weissert has struggled mightily since a shutdown inning in the Red Sox Marathon Monday win over the Tigers. Those struggles continued as Weissert failed to record an out, allowing two singles and walking a batter as Tampa took a two-run lead, 5-3. The right-hander gave way to rookie Tyler Samaniego, who recorded the final two outs of the inning.
Since the shutdown appearance on Marathon Monday, Weissert has allowed five of the seven runners he's inherited to score, as well as three earned runs of his own on 10 hits allowed. He spoke with the media after the loss, telling MassLive.com's Christopher Smith, "It's not a secret, I'm pitching like [expletive]."
Overall, Weissert has allowed seven inherited runners to score, tied for the second most among all relievers.
The Red SOx entered Thursday with the fifth-lowest bullpen ERA in baseball at 3.30. In total, they allowed four runs while covering the final 3.2 innings of the ballgame.
The Boston offense would scrape across one more run in the eighth inning thanks to a Jarren Duran double, followed by a Wilyer Abreu sac fly, but it wouldn't be enough as Tampa won 8-4. With the loss, the Red Sox fell to 3-7 against American League East foes.
These two teams will be back at it on Friday night in game two of the four-game weekend series at Fenway. Connelly Early will get the start for Boston opposite Jesse Scholtens for Tampa. First pitch set for 7:10 p.m. ET.
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