The Red Sox fell to the Atlanta Braves 4-1 Friday night as they were thoroughly dominated by a heretofore ineffectual Jair Jurrjens for nearly eight innings.
The difficulties for the Sox lineup were apparent from the get go, as Daniel Nava struck out in their first at bat of the game. Adrian Gonzalez would pick up a hit in the first, but it was an opposite-field single against the shift as he swung late on a fastball and jammed it past a vacant third base.
That would be the only hit the Sox would get until the eighth inning. Meanwhile, the Braves were nickle-and-diming Jon Lester to a high pitch count, but not to death, with no runs coming across despite three straight innings with hits to start the game. It wasn't until the leadoff hitters started reaching that Atlanta started getting on the board. The Braves would pick up a leadoff baserunner in every one of the last six innings, and they saw immediate dividends, as Freddie Freeman reached on a single, moved to second on a one-out double from Jason Heyward, and then scored the first run of the game on a ground ball out. Heyward would follow in his footsteps on a double from Andrelton Simmons to make it 2-0.
The Braves would add another run in the sixth, but they wouldn't even need it. The Sox wouldn't score until the eighth inning, when Will MIddlebrooks and Daniel Nava finally broke the team's hit drought with a pair of wall ball doubles to center and left field respectively. Middlebrooks would score, but with Dustin Pedroia grounding out behind him, the rally ended there. Craig Kimbrel came in for a quick ninth inning to close the Sox out and end their night of frustration.
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