Red Sox blown out by Nationals in final home game before All-Star break

BOSTON — In their last home game before the 2026 MLB All-Star break, the Red Sox played very much like a team on the road to nowhere.

Payton Tolle’s worst start of the season, combined with a lifeless Boston offense, sunk the Sox on a steamy Wednesday afternoon in which the only thing hotter than the 95-degree weather at first pitch was the opposing lineup.

The end result was a Washington Nationals' 10-2 blowout and series victory.

Velocity was slightly down on all five pitch types Tolle threw — four-seam fastball, cutter, sinker, curveball and change-up — as he turned in his shortest and most ineffective start of the season. Over three innings, the southpaw allowed six earned runs on seven hits, walked three and struck out five. Said hits included Andrés Chaparro and Nasim Nuñez’s first home runs of the year.

It marked the second consecutive game without a Red Sox quality start, after 12 consecutively, the second-longest streak in franchise history since the Live-Ball Era began in 1920. Sox pitchers also combined to allow eight or more earned runs for the second consecutive game, after only allowing six runs total over the previous four.

Tolle opened with a strikeout to left-fielder James Wood. It was downhill from there, as Curtis Mead tripled and scored on Chaparro’s Green Monster homer. Tolle walked No. 4 hitter Dylan Crews and gave up a two-out double to Jacob Young before ending the inning.

The rest of the damage Tolle incurred came in the top of the fourth, which he exited without recording an out, and after giving up a leadoff, first-pitch homer to Nuñez and loading the bases on a Drew Millas single and back-to-back walks to Wood and Mead.

The Boston bullpen owned the second-best ERA (3.38) and WHIP (1.22) in the American League before the finale, but none of the four Red Sox relievers who took the mound in the contest managed a clean inning.

Red Sox interim manager Chad Tracy first turned to Ryan Watson, but found no relief in the pitching change. The rookie right-hander gave up a two-run single to pinch-hitter Luis García Jr. to push the Nats’ lead to 5-0, and Crews’ single reloaded the bases. Daylen Lile grounding into a double play finally put two outs on the board, but also plated another run, and Jacob Young’s subsequent double scored García before Watson induced a groundout from Jorbit Vivas to bring the five-run inning to an end.

Lefty Jovani Morán allowed one earned run, walked two and struck out three in a hitless 1 2/3 innings of work in his first game back from the injured list. And rookie southpaw Alec Gamboa, recalled from Triple-A Worcester for the game, pitched the last two innings; the Nats tagged him for two earned runs on three hits, including a homer, four walks, and one strikeout.

The Nats’ bats were blazing hot, with 13 hits and a whopping 10 walks, the first double-digit walk game by Red Sox pitchers since June 23, 2025 (at Angels) and exactly four years ago, on July 1, 2022 (at Cubs).

The Boston bats looked overheated. They tallied nine hits, four walks and struck out 10 times.

Right-hander Brad Lord opened for the Nationals, and worked around two hits and two walks in 2 1/3 innings.

Andrew Alvarez’s bulk relief outing was even more impressive: 4 2/3 innings, two hits, one walk and six strikeouts, on 74 pitches (46 for strikes).

The rare occasions when the Red Sox lineup began to piece something together were over as quickly as they began. All told, they were 1 for 11 with runners in scoring position and left 11 men on base.

Wilyer Abreu singled with two outs in the bottom of the first and was joined on the bases when Willson Contreras received a four-pitch walk. Neither man advanced, as designated hitter Romy Gonzalez grounded out to second to end the inning.

A leadoff single by No. 9 hitter Connor Wong and a walk to Anthony Seigler put two on to begin the bottom of the third, and Wong advanced to third on Ceddanne Rafaela’s flyout to right. Abreu was initially ruled safe at first base on a force-out that scored Wong, but Washington’s successful challenge turned it into an inning-ending double play.

Boston loaded the bases in the bottom of the fifth, on a leadoff hit-by-pitch to Nate Eaton, subsequent double by Andruw Monasterio, and two-out walk by Rafaela, only for Abreu to strike out on a foul tip on the ninth pitch of his at-bat.

Contreras led off the bottom of the sixth with a single, but nothing came from that, either.

In the seventh inning, a crowd of shirtless fans clustered in the center-field bleachers near Ted Williams’ iconic red seat alternated between chants of “Sell the team!”, “USA!” and “(Expletive) the Yankees!”

As Rafaela led off the eighth with a single, the group switched to chanting “Score a run!”

They got their wish. Back-to-back one-out singles by Contreras and Gonzalez loaded the bases, and this time, the Red Sox took advantage. Caleb Durbin walked on six pitches to bring Rafaela home, and Eaton grounding into a force-out scored Contreras while erasing Durbin at second.

Andruw Monasterio was then called out on strikes to end the inning, stranding runners on the corners.

Facing Carson Palmquist in the bottom of the ninth, the Red Sox wasted a leadoff single by Wong and one-out double by Rafaela.

The Red Sox are 37-47, and now head out on a three-city road trip that will carry them into the All-Star break.