The Red Sox took care of business against the Philadelphia Phillies on Sunday afternoon, completing a three-game sweep of by far the worst team in baseball. Boston hasn’t swept a three-game series since June 5-7, when they swept the Oakland A’s. Beating the teams you should beat is a good step in the right direction, especially considering that the Sox only find themselves one game behind the Baltimore Orioles for 4th place in the AL East. Getting out of last place would be nice, if only because it would stop people from calling them the “last-place Red Sox.”

Some lineup stuff: Brock Holt got the start at third base in place of Pablo Sandoval, who’s still out with back tightness. Supposedly, he’ll be back for the Labor Day opener against the Blue Jays today. Holt’s shift to third opened up second base for Josh Rutledge to get a start. Rusney Castillo and Jackie Bradley, Jr. continued to play each other’s recent positions, with Castillo taking left field and Bradley manning the right field spot.

The offense took care of business early in this one. With two outs in the bottom of the 1st, Xander Bogaerts singled and David Ortiz took advantage of the opportunity.

Phillies starter Jerad Eickhoff tried to sneak a low, inside-ish fastball on a 3-1 count, and Big Papi showed off his still-incredible bat speed to take it deep to right for home run number 497 of his career and a 2-0 lead.

Castillo doubled down the right field line to keep the good vibes going in the bottom of the 2nd inning, but he also harshed on those vibes pretty hard by getting too good a jump on an attempted steal of third. Eickhoff, alerted by shouting from his infielders, saw Castillo out of the corner of his eye and threw to Cody Asche at third for the inning’s first out.

Ryan Hanigan, however, took the next pitch after Castillo’s aborted steal to right field for a single, and Rutledge drew a walk after a tough 9-pitch at-bat. With this setup, Jackie Bradley did yet another Jackie Bradley thing, smacking a triple into the right field corner to score both runners. Mookie Betts played his part too, reaching across the plate to single a breaking ball into left field to bring Bradley home and extend the lead to 5-0. Holt singled and Bogaerts walked to load the bases, and Ortiz hit a deep fly ball to center field, flirting with 498 but settling for a sacrifice fly to score Boston’s sixth and final run of the game. Ortiz left the game after this RBI with tightness in his right calf, but he’s back in the lineup for today’s game, so no worries there.

Philadelphia responded to some extent in the top of the 3rd inning: Freddy Galvis singled, Odubel Herrera walked, and Cesar Hernandez singled to bring Galvis around from second. But Eduardo Rodriguez settled down to get out of the jam, going 1-2-3 from that point forward to end the Phillies’ half of the 3rd.

Rodriguez also nearly gave up another run in the 4th inning, but Mookie Betts traveled a long way to track down a fly ball that might’ve landed over the wall in the triangle.

The Sox threatened again in the bottom of the 6th, drawing three walks from reliever Dalier Hinojosa to load the bases, but it came to nothing.

Philly got a run off Robbie Ross, Jr. in the 9th, but it was aided by Freddy Galvis’ advancing to second on defensive indifference.

Notes:

The Red Sox taped Henry Owens to a pole in the dugout, and taped his mouth shut too. More than anything, this clip just makes me think about how much I’m gonna miss Don Orsillo.

Owens isn’t in bad company with this kind of treatment: