I’m gonna level with you here. I fell asleep during the game last night, so I’m officially an old man. We were up 2-1 when I fell asleep and we were down 3-2 when I woke up and I was too tired and ashamed to rewind and figure out where I nodded off, so I just went to bed.

At this point, the fact that the Sox lost isn’t even surprising or interesting to me anymore, so let’s talk about how much Jerry Remy hates Josh Maurer instead. It’s palpable. Maurer’s just doing his thing, describing every single detail he can possibly latch onto, and he’ll throw it over to Jerry, and he gets nothing. Crickets. It’s even better when they cut to a view of the booth and Maurer has a grin plastered on his face during every awkward exchange. Pure comedy. We need to get in the Vine game and put together a blog of every uncomfortable moment.

Worse, Maurer has gone 0-7 during his stint as the play-by-play man, and while I’m sure he’s a perfectly nice guy, his presence has clearly been poison. And like Righty said last night, Remy can probably hardly stand Orsillo, so throwing some young go-getter from Pawtucket in the booth with him was doomed from the start. Or from my perspective, television gold.

Anyway, what happened in this game? Wade Miley didn’t pitch very well (the 5 walks jump out at me), but he got around the trouble he found himself in and only gave up 1 run through 6 innings.

PITCHERS	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA
Miley	6.0	4	1	1	5	4	1	4.33

Mookie Betts and David Ortiz both doubled in the first inning to open the scoring, but Miley gave that run right back on a solo home run by Marwin “Not a Real First Name” Gonzalez in the bottom half of the inning.

With two outs in the top of the 2nd and Mike Napoli coming to the plate, most Red Sox fans were probably thinking about what channel they’d switch to at the commercial, but Napoli absolutely crushed a Lance McCullers breaking ball that he left high and inside over the porch in left field. Ryan Hanigan followed that with a single, and Betts walked, and Holt singled…! But Brian Butterfield made a bad decision in sending Hanigan home, and the catcher was thrown out pretty easily to end the two-out rally.

Miley held strong throughout his start, allowing several runners into scoring position but preventing them from actually scoring. He even got some help from Hanigan in the 5th, who threw out Altuve at third on a ball on the dirt.

It was in the 7th inning that I fell asleep and things went sour. Alexi Ogando relieved Miley, got an out, then promptly gave up a game-tying home run to a pinch-hitting lefty Colby Rasmus. 2-2. Then he gave up a single to Altuve and was relieved by Junichi Tazawa, who was probably not expecting to enter the game before the 8th. But that’s no excuse for his performance: two doubles and a single, giving up two runs in the process. The damage would have been worse if not for a good relay that got Marwin “Not a Real First Name” Gonzalez stretching for a triple.

It looks to me like Mookie screwed up by stepping forward first, but it was solid contact either way, and Tazawa clearly just didn’t have it. Tommy Layne came in to get the last out of the inning.

But guess what happened in the top of the 8th? The Sox rallied! Against no less than Will Harris, one of the best relievers in MLB this year. Big Papi took him deep to open the inning and make it 4-3. The Astros had been throwing him high fastballs all night, and you could tell he was just itching to take one over the fence. Then Hanley Ramirez singled on a bloop down the right field line and stole second!

Sandoval struck out and De Aza popped out, and old reliable came up to the plate with 2 outs. That’s right, Mike Napoli. As it turns out, I don’t know what got into him last night, but he was clutch again. Or the baseball gods gave the Sox a break after Betts’ poor defensive play in the 7th, because Preston Tucker’s reaction was even worse. He just kind of stood there as the ball sailed over his head. It was a legitimate super-clutch double off Luke Gregerson, brought in specifically to get Napoli out (?!). And the score was tied at 4. Napoli advanced to third on a wild pitch, but Hanigan grounded out to end the chance.

Craig Breslow came in for the 8th and made quick work of Carter, Conger, and Hoes. But after getting Rasmus to fly out in the 9th, he gave up a walkoff solo shot to Jose Altuve of all people. Turns out Altuve has 9 home runs on the year, but still. Not a great look. It was actually a pretty good pitch, low in the zone. But Altuve is pretty low in the zone himself.

At least the trip is over.

First, some stuff that happened: Devin Marrero, Steven Wright, and Brian Johnson were all sent back down to Pawtucket. So much for Johnson filling in for Clay Buchholz, who just got a platelet-rich plasma injection in his elbow. Who got called up? Why, none other than the thumb-headed idiot himself, Daniel Nava, and everyone’s favorite potential-ridden number 5 starter, Joe Kelly.

In case you were wondering what the Red Sox rotation looks like right now, in order of 2015 ERA:

1. Wade Miley – 4.49

2. Eduardo Rodriguez – 4.64

3. Joe Kelly – 5.74

4. Rick Porcello – 5.79

5. Random call-up/Justin Masterson/a ham sandwich – ???/5.98/probably sub-5.00

Your 2015 Red Sox!

Anyway, Nava didn’t play last night, but Kelly was the starter, and he immediately brought me back to the hopeful days of May, when he’d do things like this. Sprinkling some parsley on a fastball and laying it out for Preston Tucker on the outer half of the plate on a full count when Swihart wanted it inside? It’s just like when we were getting to know each other, Joe! Tucker crushed it to center to take a very early 1-0 lead.

Kelly gave up two more home runs, and that was all the Astros did to score in this one. To make it 2-0, Evan Gattis hit a line drive homer to left that got out of the park in a hurry:

This came on another miss by Kelly, a slider that stayed hanging up and in on Gattis. He’s not the kind of guy you want to give a hanging slider. But that’s just me. The 3rd Houston home run of the night was Tucker again. He pulled a low fastball to right field for a no-doubter 2-run jack.

As for the offense, it was actually above average for this road trip, so: well done offense! Just kidding, you stink. It must be said that Boston’s 2-10 with RISP is better than the Astros’ 0-5. Congratulations on that. I think my favorite part was when we were down 4-2 with men on 1st and 2nd and McHugh was clearly on the skids, and Swihart bunted directly to the pitcher for a force out at third. That was a real magical moment.

Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

Notes:

• Dustin Pedroia recorded his first hit since returning from the disabled list. It was an RBI double to the gap in right center. Pretty good.