Willson Contreras wastes no time, homers in his first at-bat following his five-game suspension
While the Red Sox were running away with the early end of the doubleheader, Willson Contreras was finishing out his five-game suspension.
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He asked for permission to watch the game from home and, considering the long day ahead, interim manager Chad Tracy was happy to grant it.
“If he did come in, he was gonna have to come in and then he has to leave again and come back,” Tracy said.
Watching the Sox steamroll the Rays, 10-0, in Game 1, Contreras could sense a team that came out of the All-Star break hungry.
“I watched the whole game and it was a grind,” he said. “I just loved the way the guys come out. They’re coming out of the gate with a lot of energy and a lot of passion and they want to win so bad.”
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The Sox churned out 15 hits in Game 1. When Contreras arrived for the nightcap, he wanted to keep the momentum going.
“I was just trying to be one more guy like them,” he said.
Hitting cleanup and playing first base in his return, Contreras made an immediate impact with a solo home run off Mason Englert in his first at-bat.
It was his 21st of the season and it came on the heels of Wilyer Abreu swatting a game-tying two-run homer, making it also Contreras’s 10th go-ahead home run this year.
“It’s really fun to watch him, especially today,” Abreu said a 5-3 win in Game 2, Boston’s 11th straight victory. “He just comes back after five [games] and he hit a homer in his first at-bat. He’s an amazing player, amazing person and he deserves all the things happening to him.”
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