Brayan Bello exits early, Tarik Skubal strikes out 10 Red Sox in Tigers win

It took Brayan Bello 35 pitches to get through a seven-batter first inning in which the Detroit Tigers loaded the bases and scored their first run.

Tarik Skubal’s pitch count didn’t reach 35 until the end of his third perfect inning.

With beginnings such as those, the Red Sox needed a miracle to take the second game of the long-weekend quartet. But after Friday night’s 1-0 extra-inning walk-off win, miracles were in short supply, and the Tigers evened the series with a 4-1 finish.

It looked like a pitchers’ duel for brief time, when Bello matched Skubal with 1-2-3 second and third innings and retired eight consecutive batters. But for the second time in three starts this month, a blowup fourth inning brought Bello’s day to an early end.

With one out into the fourth, Kerry Carpenter woke up a sleepy Tigers lineup with a solo home run into the visitors’ bullpen. Wenceel Pérez followed with a walk, and Javy Baez’s double put both men in scoring position. Jake Rogers flew out to Ceddanne Rafaela, whose tumbling throw home was too late to prevent the run from scoring, and rookie Kevin McGonigle’s RBI single plated Detroit’s fourth run before Bello finished the frame with a strikeout of Gleyber Torres.

Skubal made mincemeat of the righty-heavy lineup Red Sox manager Alex Cora deployed. Over six innings of one-run ball, the Tigers ace yielded four hits, walked two and struck out a season-high 10 batters. Bello needed 84 pitches to get through four frames, Skubal finished the sixth inning at 89.

Skubal didn’t allow a baserunner until Roman Anthony’s leadoff walk in the fourth, and had a no-hitter going until the fifth, when the Red Sox loaded the bases with no outs on a Wilyer Abreu single, Ceddanne Rafaela double and Caleb Durbin walk. Boston bailed Skubal out, though. The Red Sox scored only one run, coming on Connor Wong’s double-play before Isiah Kiner-Falefa flew out on the first pitch.

The Red Sox helped the back-to-back AL Cy Young-winner in the sixth, too. Anthony and Andruw Monasterio began the inning with back-to-back singles, and Anthony advanced to third on the latter. This time, Boston came away with nothing, as Skubal retired the next three batters.

Boston tallied five hits, two walks and struck out 12 times. They went 0 for 6 with runners in scoring position and left five men on base.

Left-hander Jovani Moran played the role of stopgap with aplomb, taking over for Bello and holding the Tigers to one hit, one walk, and striking out three over three scoreless innings. Greg Weissert and Zack Kelly followed with a scoreless inning apiece.

As fog encroached on the city skyline, a sold-out crowd of 36,527 watched the Red Sox go in order in the seventh and eighth. In the ninth, the Tigers turned to veteran closer and ex-Red Sox Kenley Jansen. The spark of Willson Contreras’ leadoff single fizzled out quickly, as Trevor Story grounded into a force-out, Abreu lined out on the first pitch and Rafaela popped up to complete a game long lost.

The Red Sox are 8-12. Game 3 of the series is at 1:35 p.m. ET on Sunday.