Raise your hand if you had “Pitchers’ duel between Matt Manning and Michael Wacha” on your 2022 MLB Bingo card, simply so I may call you a liar.
And yet, that was precisely how the first half of this game seemed to shake out. Wacha’s outing was a little less impressive than Manning’s, but the Red Sox started did manage to hold the Tigers to one run into the fifth inning before giving way to the Sox bullpen. Manning, on the other hand, didn’t give up any hits until the fifth inning.
Let’s break it down inning-by-inning shall we?