BOSTON — The Red Sox score board finally looked like the kind Boston wanted to see. Jarren Duran broke open Tuesday night’s game with a three-run blast with two outs in the ninth inning, and Boston beat the Royals 7-1 to snap a 10-game stretch without scoring more than three runs.
The win gave Boston a chance to chase a third straight victory Wednesday night, while also going for its second sweep of the season with Connelly Early on the mound against Kansas City’s Michael Wacha. Duran finished 5-for-14 with four extra-base hits over the last four games, a burst that arrived when the lineup needed it most.
Willson Contreras also supplied the kind of production that can change a series. He had two hits and three RBIs in Tuesday night’s win, and he went 6-for-16 with seven RBIs over the last four games. Boston’s offense, quiet for most of the previous stretch, suddenly had enough length to matter beyond a single inning.
The result carried extra weight because the Red Sox have spent much of May winning in low-scoring games. Since April 7, they were 17-4 when they scored at least three runs, and they improved to 19-0 when leading after seven innings. They also allowed two or fewer earned runs in 13 of 17 games in May, which has given them a path even when the bats have been slow to catch up.
That made Tuesday night’s outburst more than a one-off. Boston improved to 5-10-1 in series play and 4-5 on the road in series play after the win, numbers that show how much work remains even when the club gets the sort of late cushion Duran provided. The Red Sox entered the game at 21-27, and the Royals were 20-29, a reminder that both clubs have been trying to find steadier footing for much of the spring.
Early brought his own layer of interest to Wednesday’s matchup. He had allowed more than three runs just once in his nine starts this season, and he was facing the Royals for the first time. Wacha, meanwhile, was familiar to Boston. He went 11-2 with a 3.32 ERA in 23 starts for the Red Sox in 2022, and he was 3-1 with a 2.33 ERA in five career starts against them.
Two of Willson Contreras’s four hits off Wacha were home runs, a detail that underscored how quickly a familiar pitcher can become a dangerous one. The Royals needed that kind of edge against a Boston team that had finally found some offense Tuesday night and was trying to turn a single burst into a winning run over the rest of the week.
The Red Sox were off Thursday before opening a six-game homestand at Fenway on Friday against the Twins, a stretch that should show whether Tuesday night was the start of something more durable or just the kind of brief lift that fades once the series changes. For now, the 7-1 win gave Boston exactly what it had been missing: runs, separation and a clean result to carry into Wednesday.
