SEATTLE — This was how well Clay Buchholz pitched here last night: He made Red Sox manager John Farrell forget how good Nelson Cruz is.
By the time Cruz came to the plate with the winning run on second base in the ninth inning of a tie game, he had struck out three times on a total of 14 pitches from Buchholz. But Buchholz was no longer in the game, and rather than walking the Seattle Mariners’ slugger and league leader in homers, RBI and batting average with first base open and two outs, Farrell elected to have reliever Junichi Tazawa pitch to him.