BOSTON — Luis Castillo struck out 10 while pitching six innings of one-hit ball, and the Cincinnati Reds beat Boston 2-1 on Tuesday night for their first victory at Fenway Park since Game 7 of the 1975 World Series.
Joey Votto twice doubled off the top of the outfield wall — once to left, once to right and each perhaps an inch from a home run — and Cincinnati scored both runs on Boston throwing errors.
Rafael Devers had the only hit off Castillo (2-2), who walked three before leaving with a 1-0 lead after six.
Tony Santillan, the fourth Reds pitcher, entered a one-hit shutout in the ninth and gave up a single to Kiké Hernández and a double to Devers. After J.D. Martinez and Xander Bogaerts were retired, Alex Verdugo hit a chopper that Votto couldn't handle at first, allowing one run to score on the single.
Santillan then struck out Trevor Story on three pitches to earn his fourth save.
Michael Wacha (3-1) retired the first 12 batters of the game before Votto hit one off the top of the Red Sox bullpen wall in right-center that bounced back in for a double. The Red Sox starter got the next three batters to leave Votto stranded.
In the sixth, Albert Almora Jr. and Matt Reynolds singled and Aristides Aquino hit a hard chopper to third that erased Almora in a rundown heading home. Brandon Drury popped out and then Nick Senzel hit a grounder that would have ended the inning — except Devers threw the ball up the line and into the photographer’s box, allowing the run to score.
Austin Davis relieved Wacha, who started in a Boston loss for the first time since opening week despite allowing zero earned runs on three hits and striking out three. Boston was shut out in back-to-back games by a pair of last-place teams that enter June a combined 22 games below .500.
The Reds scored another run in the ninth on another throwing error, this one by Xander Bogaerts.
SO CLOSE
Votto's double in the fifth bounced off the top of the short wall in front of the Red Sox bullpen in right-center. His double in the eighth bounced off the red line on the top of the Green Monster and caromed back to the field.
The Reds challenged the second one, arguing that it was a home run, but replays showed conclusively the ball remained in play.
OLD FRIENDS
The Red Sox are 12-2 against the Reds in interleague play, winning each of the previous nine games, and the first five at Fenway Park. The teams also met in the 1975 World Series, which Cincinnati won in seven games one day after Carlton Fisk’s arm-waving, 12th-inning homer in Game 6. (The teams split the four games at Fenway.)
In all, the Reds are 6-17-1 at the ballpark, including a 3-10-1 record against the Boston Braves when they played at Fenway for parts of the 1914-15 season.
The Reds hadn't visited Boston in 2014, which is perhaps why no one noticed that their plaque on the Green Monster’s manual scoreboard misspelled their hometown as “CINN.”
TRAINER’S ROOM
Reds: OF Tommy Pham was scratched from the lineup about two hours before the first pitch with a sore left calf. He had just finished a three-game suspension for slapping Giants outfielder Joc Pederson over a fantasy football dispute. ... RF and leadoff hitter Tyler Naquin left the game with a left quad strain. Aristides Aquino replaced him.
Red Sox: Devers was in the on-deck circle when he was hit in the chest by Hernandez’s checked swing foul ball. After Hernandez made the last out of the third, Devers took his position at third base.
UP NEXT
Boston RHP Garrett Whitlock (1-1) faces Cincinnati RHP Hunter Greene (2-6) in the finale of the two-game series.
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