Red Sox takeaways: Emotional start for Payton Tolle, Trevor Story's defense and more

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That meant his turn was bumped to Mother’s Day. In some ways, baseball provided comfort on an otherwise rough day for the 23-year-old. “This weekend is really tough for me, I’m not going to lie to you,” he said, with a long pause to gather his emotions after the 4-1 loss to Tampa Bay. “I think yesterday would have been just as hard. … I try to get away from it as much as I can, but at the same time, it’s life. It’s part of it. Some things are bigger than baseball in that aspect. And that’s where I try to get away from it and just pitch. It’s tough, but I got to figure out how to play with it anyways.” Jina Tolle never got to see her son pitch in the majors, passing away two months before the Red Sox drafted him in the second round in 2024. To honor her, he has the phrase “You’re so pretty” stitched on his glove, making it easy to see where Tolle gets his fun-loving personality from. The phrase was something Tolle’s mom would shout to him from the stands to tease him on the mound when he played for Texas Christian University. On Sunday, Tolle took the mound to “Mother” by Danzig, a tribute he had been saving. “There’s a little bit of a joke with my dad, just that song, I’ve had it in the back pocket for a long time,” he said. “It’s a pretty good walk-out song, but it’s Mother’s Day, so you got to roll with it.” On the mound, Tolle allowed a solo homer to Junior Caminero but was burned by his defense as shortstop Trevor Story made an error in the third inning, contributing to two more runs. After the 28-pitch third, Tolle bounced back to face the minimum six batters over the next two innings. In the end, he allowed three runs on seven hits over five innings while striking out four on an emotional day. He cracked a smile after the game when asked what his mom would have said of the outing: “Suck it up and do better.” Interim manager Chad Tracy, who had Tolle in Triple A last season and at the start of this year, sympathized with the big lefty. “I thought about him a lot last night with all the ‘Happy Mother’s Days’ going around,” Tracy said. ‘When you put yourself in his shoes, he’s probably thinking about that. I would say this is probably pretty meaningful to him for sure.” The Red Sox quietly have put together a very solid stretch defensively over the past month, entering Saturday with just four errors in their last 23 games. In one of the biggest surprises of the season, they lead the majors in defensive runs saved with 32, thanks in large part to Wilyer Abreu (seven), Caleb Durbin (six) and Willson Contreras (four). No other American League team has more than 14 DRS. But on Sunday, Story’s error proved costly. With the Rays leading 1-0, Tolle gave up a single, then a sacrifice bunt moved the runner over. Speedy Chandler Simpson came to the plate and hit a grounder to short that went right under Story’s glove and allowed a run to score. “I knew (the runner) was going to third and I thought for a split second I should get him out,” Story said. “Kind of took my focus off the ball a little bit. So it’s on me there.” In an odd ruling, the official scorer gave Simpson a single but added a fielding error to Story. Nevertheless, it extended the inning as Tolle got a flyout before allowing another run-scoring single. “It’s tough to win in this league making mistakes like that, so (it) can’t happen,” Story said. “And you’ve seen the way that we can play when we are playing good defense, it’s a strong suit of ours this year and that’s on me. I got to clean that one up.” Story has five errors on the season, along with no Defensive Runs Saved and minus-1 Outs Above Average. In the first inning, Martinez hit Contreras with a pitch on the right hand. The first baseman winced, but initially stayed in the game, heading to first. Then the Red Sox replaced Contreras with Andruw Monasterio in the top of the second inning. After the game, Tracy relayed that initial scans showed no fractures, but they will monitor Contreras, who’s now been hit by a pitch eight times this year. “He’s sore, that’s all we know at this point,” Tracy said, noting the team’s scheduled day off on Monday will help. “Then we’ll kind of reevaluate (Tuesday) and see how he feels, and hopefully we’re OK there.” While Boston’s offense has shown little consistency this season, losing Contreras would be a major blow, especially with Roman Anthony on the injury list with a wrist/hand sprain. In 39 games, Contreras is hitting .259 with an .847 OPS and a team-leading eight homers and 23 RBIs. Monasterio, to his credit, was ready to go from the first play, making a nice lunging tag of Ryan Vialde, who’d singled to right but was caught in a rundown. Two pitches later in the next at-bat, Monasterio caught a pop-up in foul territory. At the plate, he went 2-for-3 with a double. Still, the Red Sox are hoping Contreras won’t need more than a day. The Red Sox did receive some good news on the injury front. Ranger Suarez will start on Thursday against the Philadelphia Phillies, his former team. Suarez exited a start last Sunday with hamstring tightness but never went on the injured list. Brayan Bello will pitch in a bulk relief role in Boston’s first game against Philadelphia, as he did last week, with an opener in front of him as the Red Sox try to get him back on track. In that bulk role against the Detroit Tigers, Bello allowed one run on four hits over seven innings, his longest outing of the season. Tracy said they are still assessing which reliever will serve as the opener on Tuesday. Sonny Gray will start on Wednesday. Meanwhile, reliever Justin Slaten (oblique) came off the IL on Saturday and appeared in his first game on Sunday, pitching a scoreless inning, striking out one batter. Anthony is still receiving treatment for his injury and Garrett Crochet continues to build up his throwing program. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms