Throwing 102 mph as a 37-year-old doesn’t feel natural. Yet, Chapman continues to come out throwing gas night in and night out. Most important, he’s drastically cut down on his free passes this season with the Red Sox. His walk rate has sunk from 14% to 8% so far and if that remains in check, there’s no reason he won’t continue to be a shutdown closer.

That out came after Robert Stock had given up a couple of runs at put another couple of runners on with two outs, putting the tying run in the on-deck circle. That’s when Red Sox’ skipper Alex Cora turned to Chapman to end the threat. The 37-year-old southpaw needed just three pitches to strike out Anthony Volpe to end it. On the season, he sports a brilliant 1.71 ERA to go with a 35/9 K/BB ratio over 26 1/3 innings and 11 saves in his first 12 chances.

It’s Chapman’s fourth career save against his former team; he previously had one in 2012 with the Reds and two last year with the Pirates. Tonight, he got two groundouts and a strikeout in the 11-pitch outing. He’s thrown 19 pitches in six days, so he’ll definitely be fine if needed again Sunday.

Chapman got a quick visit from the trainer in the middle of the outing, but he continued without making any warmup throws. If he did tweak something, it didn’t seem to be an arm issue. The Red Sox could ill afford to lose him anyway, but that’s especially the case after they already put Justin Slaten on the IL today. Greg Weissert is probably next in line for saves ahead of Garrett Whitlock.