Red Sox win 13th straight, complete sweep of Rays

The Red Sox beat the Rays 6-1 at Fenway Park on July 19 to stretch their winning streak to 13 and finish a four-game sweep of Tampa Bay. Sonny Gray worked six innings of one-run ball, and Willson Contreras provided the lift with a two-run home run.

The run matched the second-longest winning streak in Red Sox franchise history, and Major League Baseball said it was Boston’s first 13-game streak since 1948. It also pushed the Red Sox back to .500 on the 2026 season, a striking shift for a team that had spent much of the first half searching for consistency.

That matters because this surge has not been built on one narrow formula. Gray gave Boston length on the mound, the kind of start that can steady a staff over the grind of a playoff race, while Contreras supplied the kind of extra-base damage that changes a divisional game quickly. Boston has now strung together four consecutive series sweeps, a run that suggests the club is not just winning one-off games but sustaining clean stretches against different opponents.

Sweeping Tampa Bay carried added weight because it came against a division rival, the sort of series that can alter standings and tiebreakers later in the year. A four-game sweep also magnified the message around Boston’s current form: the Red Sox are not merely hot, they are stacking complete series and doing it under interim manager Chad Tracy.

Tracy sounded as though he had little doubt about where the night was headed. “Never a doubt,” he said with a laugh after the game. “Electric. It was awesome.”

The larger question now is whether Boston’s surge can survive the volatility that usually ends baseball streaks. The club has already shown it can win with pitching, timely power and enough consistency to turn a long run into a .500 record and a real place in the postseason conversation.