What matters most to the Boston Red Sox is that 23-year-old lefty Payton Tolle pitched his team to a 7-0 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays on Thursday afternoon at Rogers Centre. It ended a five-game Boston losing streak, and, well, how else to say it: Five straight losses had been jussssst enough for anxious Sox fans to wonder if that 15-game winning streak a few weeks back was a midsummer mirage.Tolle walked the first batter of the game on four pitches, then proceeded to stifle the Blue Jays the rest of the afternoon. He retired 17 batters in a row, this on a day when the score was 1-0 after seven innings. See, Max Scherzer was the opposing pitcher, and the 42-year-old, Hall of Fame-bound warhorse allowed just one run in five innings. The Sox didn’t break it open until an eighth-inning grand slam by Caleb Durbin, the gritty Boston third baseman who’s been playing with an injured left pinky finger that by all accounts is about as stable as week-old ground beef.So, yes, it was a big, big outing for Tolle — a big, big guy who’s now 8-6 with a 2.97 ERA in 20 starts in his first full season in the big leagues. He’s still a rookie, though he came into the 2026 season with factory settings that included seven appearances with the Sox in 2025. And that’s what I’d like to discuss here for a bit. That is, now that we’ve established that Tolle pitched great against the Blue Jays, that the Red Sox won, that the club is on to Pittsburgh hoping to assemble another fat winning streak, and that Sox fans can continue to believe this oddball season will continue into October.Why the Red Sox resurgence is historicKen Rosenthal and Johnny SweetThe beauty of watching Tolle, who allowed only two hits in eight innings Thursday, is that he still presents himself as someone who just arrived from Triple-A Worcester. There’s an oh-my-God-I-can’t-believe-I’m-in-the-big-leagues twitch in every pitch. When he ends an inning with a strikeout, it’s as though he’s Chris Sale grinding the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Manny Machado to dust for the final out of the 2018 World Series. When he greets players in the dugout, it’s with a happiness that suggests seeing old buddies at a 25th high school reunion.You may recall that last year Tolle made a guest appearance in a reality series that’s all the rage these days: Candid Camera-type videos in which a minor-leaguer is called into the manager’s office on some pretense and then told he’s going to The Show. The players respond with a rainbow of emotions, from cheers to tears, and the videos are must-see TV when they land on social media. We were gifted one of those moments last August when then-Worcester manager Chad Tracy brought in Tolle to tell him the big club would be playing the Pirates on Sunday at Fenway. It would be Paul Skenes on the mound for the Pirates, and “TBD” for the Red Sox. And then the kicker: “We’re thinking of turning that TBD into Tolle. What do you think?”Tolle’s actions suggested he thought that was a swell idea. He ran a hand across his face. Then it was up, up and away. As in, he looked down and then up. He delivered two thumbs up. He laughed, and then stood up and threw a hug on his manager. As a slice of Americana that’s guaranteed to make you feel good about yourself, Norman Rockwell couldn’t have painted it any better.