BOSTON — Manager Alex Cora and Zack Kelly’s wife, Brittany, delivered a similar message to the right-handed reliever.
“I got home the other night and my wife was like, ‘You need to be consistent. You’ve got the stuff to do it,’” Kelly said after Boston’s 5-4 walkoff win over the Athletics at Fenway Park on Wednesday.
The 30-year-old Kelly recorded two crucial outs in the 10th inning to prevent the Athletics’ automatic runner from scoring. Boston won it in the bottom of the inning when Nick Sogard delivered his first career walkoff RBI on a fielder’s choice.
“As far as stuff, he’s one of the best we have,” Cora said. “We just need him to be consistent. Today was a big first step.”
Cora has been saying the same thing for years. He called Kelly “one of our best” when the righty posted a 1.45 ERA (18 ⅔ innings, three earned runs) in his final 14 appearances before the 2024 All-Star break. But Kelly posted a 7.59 ERA in 24 outings during the second half last year.
Kelly and the staff “had a pretty spirited conversation” about the importance of being more consistent from outing to outing.
“We’ve had that conversation quite a few times,” Kelly said. “We’ve had it quite a few times. And I feel confident in myself, I feel confident in my stuff. It’s just the consistency part but I feel like I’ve really made like a mental adjustment. Just the last couple nights, like deliberately trying to be calm and be intentional with what I’m trying to do out there. The results have been great.”
The Sox recalled Kelly from Triple-A Worcester on Sept. 1, when rosters expanded from 26 to 28 players. He has allowed just one run in eight innings over six appearances.
“He’s one of the best here and he belongs in big leagues,” Cora said. “But to be here, you have to be consistent.”
Kelly has done his job two straight nights. He struck out the side in a scoreless ninth inning of Boston’s 2-1 loss to the A’s on Tuesday.
Kelly allowed a leadoff single in the top of the 10th inning Wednesday, putting runners at the corners. He then bore down.
“Just trying to worry about the next guy,” Kelly said. “I think it’s one of those things where earlier in the year, mindset-wise, I probably tried to do too much for that next guy.”
Kelly stayed calm, striking out Darell Hernaiz swinging and Zack Gelof to pop out to second base.
Lefty Chris Murphy replaced Kelly with two outs and struck out Nick Kurtz swinging to finish off the scoreless 10th inning.
“I’ve pitched in the last three Septembers here,” Kelly said. “We sucked. It hadn’t been like this. And so now getting to experience this after ’22 and ’23 and ’24 is one of those things where it’s different.”
Kelly called it “probably the best team win” in his four years with Boston.
“Just the back and forth, the energy in the stadium, everybody got involved and like just all around,” Kelly said. “I can’t think of a better team win for the entire time that I’ve been up here.”
Kelly felt he pitched well for Worcester in August even if the results didn’t always show it.
“I was really happy with what I was doing down there, but we were also pitching well up here,” he said. “And so it was one of those things where you kind of try to take care of your job and just wait for the opportunity. And that came.”
Cora said both Kelly and Murphy gained valuable experience Wednesday.
“A lot of guys grew up today and that’s where we are too,” Cora said. “It’s not like we have a bunch of veterans that know what happens in October. So that was a huge learning experience for those two guys.”
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