Fighting to hold on to a Wild Card spot in the American League, the Boston Red Sox are not going to let Juan Soto beat them, so they approached him carefully in the series opener last night in Washington, D.C.’s Nationals Park, walking him four times, not intentionally, but in a pitching him carefully kind of way.
Soto, of course, took his walks, and struck out the one time Sox’ starter Eduardo Rodriguez challenged him with a runner on first and two out in the fifth, in what was a 0-0 game at that point.
As the Nationals noted on Twitter last night, Soto’s four-walk game was his 52nd career game reaching base 4+ times, and now the 22-year-old slugger is behind only Ted Williams (54) in MLB history when it comes to total games reaching base 4+ times before turning 23.