The Red Sox fell to the Orioles 6-2 as Jeremy Guthrie held the Red Sox lineup in check for seven innings.
Fresh off scoring 15 runs against the Orioles on Monday, the Sox may have been expected to carry some of the momentum over. Instead, they looked more like they did when they went 16 frames with the Tampa Bay Rays. Making use of his entire arsenal, Guthrie kept the Red Sox largely off balance, making them take weak swings and pound the ball into the ground over and over again.
The only damage done against Guthrie came in the fifth inning, when Jarrod Saltalamacchia cleaned out an inside fastball with Josh Reddick on base for a two-run shot that just barely cleared the wall. That inning was really the only chance the Sox had to do some damage and chase Guthrie from the game, as two more men would reach with two outs, but Dustin Pedroia grounded out to end the threat, letting the Baltimore starter get deep in the game. That would prove costly, as even the Orioles bullpen proved capable of recording six outs. Had it been nine or twelve, things might have been hugely different.
Kyle Weiland did give the Sox a chance to win the game in his second Major League start. While he ran into some early trouble when he left the ball up in the zone far too often, giving up three runs in the first three innings, Weiland started to locate his pitches better as the night progressed, and managed to shut the Orioles down in the middle three frames.
The Sox still had a chance late in the game until Alfredo Aceves fell apart in the eighth, giving up a pair of long balls to put the Orioles up by four headed into the ninth. The Sox went down in order, and the Orioles finally managed to take a game from Boston.