MIAMI -- After scuffling for runs for much of the last week, the Red Sox exploded offensively at Marlins Park Wednesday night, pounding out 14 hits in a 10-2 rout of Miami.
The 10 runs were nearly as many as the team had scored in its previous five games (12) combined, and included an inning in which they batted around and saw Nick Punto collect as many hits in that frame as he had for the entire month of May.
"We needed to score some runs,'' said David Ortiz, who got the Red Sox on the board in the third with an opposite-field homer, his 15th of the season. "We've been a little short. Our pitching's been stepping up and we've been facing some good pitching the past week. It's crazy how that works.''
The 10 runs were the most the Sox had scored in a game since May 13 when they scored 12 in a 12-1 bashing of Cleveland.
The first four hitters in the Red Sox lineup had multi-hit games, with Adrian Gonzalez leading the way with three hits. Gonzalez had two RBI, to along with three RBI for Ortiz.
In all, six different Red Sox hitters had at least two hits and six different Red Sox had at least one RBI.
Punto, who took an .188 batting average into the game, opened the eighth with a pinch-hit double off the wall in right. When the lineup rolled over, he came up a second time and drilled a two-run single, becoming the first Red Sox hitter to collect two hits in an inning -- with one of them being a pinch-hit -- since Eric Hinske did so on July 21, 2007.