The San Diego Padres’ bullpen gave the Boston Red Sox trouble in the final two games of their three-game weekend series.
Padres’ relievers pitched eleven innings on Saturday and Sunday and surrendered just two runs, powering San Diego to back-to-back victories. After the series finale, Red Sox manager Alex Cora called the unit the best in baseball.
While the Padres won two of three games in the series, the Red Sox bullpen went toe-to-toe with them.
“The cool thing that I can say is we have the third-best bullpen in the big leagues,” Cora said.
Cora probably has a metric in mind for his ranking, though it’s difficult to say which one. By ERA, the Red Sox are tied for fourth-best. By fWAR, they rank fifth.
Regardless of the metric or Cora’s assessment, it’s the best Red Sox bullpen in