BOSTON — Payton Tolle showed up at Fenway Park on Sunday morning, saluted his manager as he does every day and began to prepare for his start, despite the uncertainty of a game time with a lingering rainstorm.
“He came in and gave me my salute this morning,” interim manager Chad Tracy said, “and he said, ‘3:05?’ And I was like, ‘Plan on it.’ And he’s like, ‘But be ready to pivot?’ I was like, ‘Be ready to pivot.’ And that was the last I saw him. So he’ll be ready.”
Tolle wasn’t just ready; he was immaculate.
Three minutes after throwing the first pitch of the game, Tolle walked off the mound and pumped his fist, having recorded just the eighth immaculate inning on record for the Red Sox. Tolle‘s first inning set the tone for Boston’s 4-1 win over Kansas City to take the series.
“I don’t think I had seen one in person,” Tracy said. “I have now.”
The Red Sox, now 82-68, maintain a comfortable six-game lead in the second AL Wild Card spot while remaining 4 1/2 games back of the Yankees for the top spot.
Sunday’s finale was originally slated to start at 1:05 p.m. ET, but on Saturday the game was pushed back to 3:05 p.m. due to forecasted rain. The game was further delayed on Sunday, with Tolle taking the mound and throwing the first pitch at 4:55 p.m. Even with the shifting start time, Tolle maintained his composure.
After the lefty got Royals leadoff hitter Nick Loftin looking, immaculate thoughts crept into Tolle’s head. When Bobby Witt Jr. went down swinging, that’s when Tracy got on board. Two pitches into Jac Caglianone’s at-bat, Tolle looked over to the dugout to exchange a smile with his pitching coach before retiring Caglianone on a 97.9 mph fastball –- his fastest pitch of the inning – to complete the feat.
“It’s one of those things where I think about it way too early,” Tolle said. “After we had three straight strikes, I was like, you know, it pops into the brain. It’s probably bad, I probably need to be better about not thinking about that kind of stuff. But it definitely was there.”
Tolle’s immaculate inning is the first since Chris Sale struck out the side on nine consecutive pitches on Aug. 26, 2021, against Minnesota, and marked just the second on record for Boston to come in the first inning. Coincidentally, Boston’s first immaculate inning in the first frame also came after a rain delay on May 18, 2002, when Pedro Martínez recorded his own immaculate inning against the Mariners.
Rather than let the adrenaline take over, Tolle carried the momentum into the rest of his outing and went on to pitch his second straight quality start, holding the Royals’ offense to four hits and striking out seven with one walk over six scoreless innings.
“He was fantastic,” Tracy said. “He really was. Faced a little traffic there in the fifth and sixth to work his way out of both of those innings to complete six shutout innings. So just a really, really good effort on his part.”
Boston’s offense followed suit with a good late-inning effort on its part. Roman Anthony had the go-ahead single in the seventh before Willson Contreras started an eighth-inning rally which saw him and Adley Rutschman score on a Trevor Story single to give Boston a cushion.
Anthony and Contreras both credited Tolle not only for attacking hitters early, but for creating an energy that the rest of the team can feed off of. His obvious love of the game is something that’s defined his season, but was especially apparent on Sunday. After recording his first immaculate inning, the always-expressive Tolle walked back to the dugout laughing while arm in arm with his batterymate Rutschman.
“Just enjoying the moment,” Tolle said. “Try to soak those in whenever you can, because it’s a cool moment for us. Adley called another great game, so it was fun. It was a big team win, picking everybody up. I thought that was really good. It was a great series win, and just gonna keep rolling.”