The Homecoming King Leads Red Sox Longball Parade

Chicks aren’t the only ones who dig the long ball! (Here is the link if you didn’t get the reference.) Especially when two of them come from the underproductive “big-time” trade piece that Craig Breslow overpaid for at the trade deadline.

Adley Rutschman, who started his tenure with the Sox on the IL and then was less than impressive upon his return, came back from a few days off with a hyperextended elbow to blast his way into the hearts of his teammates. In his return to the ballpark he called home for the first five years of his career, Rutschman returned to the form that once won him MVP votes.

At least for a day.

Adley celebrated his return to Baltimore by launching his first homer as a member of the Sox over the high wall in right field in his first at-bat, giving Boston a quick 1-0 lead.

Baltimore matched the run in the bottom of the first with two singles and two other hard-hit balls against Jake Bennett.

In the bottom of the fourth, Luis Robert Jr. and Pete Alonso hit a couple more hard-hit balls, but this time they didn’t end up in the gloves of Red Sox players. They ended up in the hands of Orioles fans in the bleachers.

Back-to-back homers put the O’s up 3-1 and increased Chad Tracy and Craig Breslow’s blood pressure as they watched one of the few starting pitchers they thought they could rely on appear to turn into a pumpkin.

But Bennett rebounded and managed to complete six innings without surrendering another run to the Orioles, buying some time for Adley and the bats to get going again.

In the top of the sixth inning, Rutschman launched another homer into the right-center field bleachers to cut Baltimore’s lead…