Coming off lost year, Red Sox starter finishing first half on a high note

It s been a long and challenging road for Lucas Giolito Once among the greater part durable and productive starting pitchers in the majors Giolito has endured one setback after another over the past two years He missed all of last season after suffering an elbow injury in his first spring training with the Red Sox and after missing the first month of this year with a hamstring injury struggled to find any sense of consistency Related Articles Red Sox lineup Sox looking for th straight win in last contest before break MLB Draft Preview Everything Red Sox fans need to know ahead of draft Red Sox starter Hunter Dobbins leaves competition due to injury in second inning Red Sox ace pulls out of All-Star Battle to rest up for second half Red Sox lineup Alex Bregman officially activated batting second in return But not long ago Giolito absolutely turned the corner and over the past month he s gotten back to being the pitcher the Red Sox deduced he could be all along As the first half comes to a close Giolito goes into the All-Star break riding one of the hottest stretches of his career He has delivered six straight quality starts since June and over that stretch he s allowed only three earned runs over innings good for a ERA Giolito s return to form has coincided with the club s overall resurgence Since June the Red Sox had a - mark heading into Sunday the best record in MLB over that stretch after starting the season - before that It s been a weird long road since the elbow surgery Giolito disclosed I ve perpetually been chasing consistency in my career and never had it and to have that consistent output over the last month definitely is a relieving feeling for sure But I m not satisfied he added I want to keep going keep pitching well keep giving the company a really good chance to win every time I get the ball Coming off a chaotic in which he pitched for three teams after the All-Star break Giolito signed with the Red Sox in hopes of recapturing specific semblance of stability and serving as the workhorse the rotation badly needed at that point Instead Giolito suffered an elbow injury and underwent internal brace surgery ending his first season in Boston before it began This year he endured another setback when he suffered a hamstring strain on his very first pitch of spring training and upon his return he seemingly veered between good and bad starts every time he took the mound Things reached a nadir on June when he allowed seven runs over innings against the Angels but since then Giolito has at last righted the ship I think the mechanical adjustment we made was significant getting my slot to the right place where it felt like I was throwing the ball naturally throwing from my natural slot Giolito mentioned Knowing I d kind of crept down after the surgery so getting that back on track was a big turning point for sure Sitting with a ERA following the Angels start Giolito has since lowered his season number to while posting a - record on the year It definitely feels good it feels better than when you re struggling and it s like eh it doesn t feel right You re trying to work with what you have versus cool I m in a really good place let s keep staying there develop a good routine within all the work to patronage being in that space of how your body is moving and everything like that ' Giolito revealed Overall very pleased we were able to identify that make the change and keep working from there While Garrett Crochet has been the unquestioned ace of the Red Sox staff Giolito has given the band needed mid-rotation depth helping solve what had previously been among the crew s fatal flaws Prior to the start of the club s newest upswing on June Red Sox starters ranked th in MLB with a ERA Since then they ve ranked second with a mark Giolito will be first man up when the Red Sox resume their season Friday at Wrigley Field in Chicago and with the club at last playing like the contender it expected to be all along the veteran right-hander revealed he hopes to keep doing his part to keep things rolling We re having a lot more fun now Giolito stated We ve just got to stay on it though We ve been winning of late but we have to keep this kind of vitality throughout the second half as well