 The rules pertaining to determining the losing pitcher are much shorter than that of the rules for the winning pitcher The definition for the losing pitcher being that he is a pitcher who is Responsible for the run that gives the winning team a lead that that winning team does not relinquish Now a lot of times you'll see that this will be the pitcher who gives up the winning run Which is to say that that's the winning run is if you take the number of runs scored by the losing team And you add one so if Boston scores five runs and Toronto scores two runs the winning run would have been Boston's third run But that's not always the case So let's look at a quick example if Toronto's starting pitcher gave up just one run and he pitched six innings Then the score would be one to nothing after the sixth so After that Toronto brings in a relief pitcher and he gives up four more runs in the seventh inning So now it's five to nothing Boston and then in the next inning Toronto scores their two runs So after eight it's five to two Boston winning in this case Toronto's starting pitcher would be the losing pitcher Even though he had not given up the winning run because he had as the definition states Gave up the run that gave the winning team the lead that they did not relinquish and that's losing pictures