Connor Wong hit a three-run homer to punctuate a five-run fifth inning for the Boston Red Sox, who earned a 9-4 win over the visiting Texas Rangers on Tuesday.
Wong went 2-for-4 while adding a double and two runs. Ceddanne Rafaela and Rafael Devers each had two hits for Boston, which totaled 12 en route to its second consecutive win.
Boston starter Kutter Crawford (8-9) pitched 5 1/3 perfect innings before running into trouble in Texas’ four-run sixth. The right-hander didn’t record another out, and he wound up charged with four runs on three hits and a walk with four strikeouts.
After the Rangers’ response, the Red Sox pulled away in the eighth. Nick Sogard hit a bases-loaded, two-RBI single, and Romy Gonzalez added a sacrifice fly.
Leody Taveras went 2-for-4 with a double and a run for the Rangers, who have lost the first two games of the three-game series and fell to 1-5 in their past six contests.
The Red Sox jumped out to a 1-0 lead as Devers clocked a two-out double off the Green Monster in the first, scoring Masataka Yoshida from first.
After hitting a walk-off single in the 10th inning on Monday, Rob Refsnyder delivered in another clutch situation in the fifth. His hard two-run knock up the middle unloaded the bases following a Rafaela one-out single, a David Hamilton double and a walk to Yoshida against Texas starter Jose Urena (3-8).
Devers lined out to center, but Wong then blasted a three-run shot to left to chase Urena from the game after six runs in 4 2/3 innings. Urena gave up seven hits and two walks while striking out three.
Crawford went from pitching a perfect game to being pulled within a span of four batters in the sixth. With one out, Carson Kelly and Taveras singled before Marcus Semien’s wall-ball double got Texas on the board.
Corey Seager walked as Crawford’s last batter before Josh Smith’s line single to center off reliever Cam Booser and bases-loaded walks to Adolis Garcia and Nathaniel Lowe made it 6-4.
Lucas Sims retired the next two to escape the jam, striking out Wyatt Langford looking at an outside pitch to end the inning. Rangers manager Bruce Bochy was ejected for arguing the call.
After Sims exited in the seventh, Boston’s Bailey Horn got three outs before Kenley Jansen stranded the tying run in the eighth. Jansen wound up tossing 1 1/3 scoreless innings for his 22nd save.
Boston got the first four on base to produce three runs against Texas reliever Jose Leclerc in the eighth.
–Field Level Media