Steven Wright

Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Steven Wright follows through on a pitch to the Baltimore Orioles in the ninth inning of a baseball game in Baltimore, Monday, May 30, 2016. Boston won 7-2. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

(Patrick Semansky)

BALTIMORE - Steven Wright isn't often compared to Clayton Kershaw, Chris Sale or Jonny Cueto.

When he was told after Monday's 7-2 win over the Orioles that he joined the distinguished trio as the only starters in basball to have thrown three complete games this season, Wright laughed.

The knuckleballer lowered his season ERA to 2.45 and hasn't allowed more than two earned runs in any of his four starts against American League East opponents. For a pitcher who's bounced back and forth between the minors and the majors throughout his career, Wright admitted the run he's on this season has been special.

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't (think about it) because, you know, I'm in the big leagues," he said. "That's the thing that's everybody's dream."

Wright allowed two runs on four hits and five walks over nine innings while striking out seven Orioles batters. He induced a career-high 19 swings-and-misses, a testament to his wild, yet effective, knuckleball.

Wright escaped a bases-loaded jam in the second after an infield single, two walks, a wild pitch and a passed ball. He got nine-hole hitter Caleb Joseph to ground out to first to escape that threat.

In the fifth, the Orioles tagged him for two runs after Nolan Reimold led off with a triple and scored on a Jake Flaherty RBI single. Flaherty scored the tying run at the time on a sacrifice fly two batters later, but Wright settled down to get the final two outs.

The Red Sox homered three times in the sixth and eighth innings to take Wright off the hook as he cruised through the final four frames.

"I've worked hard with (Tim Wakefield), Dana (LeVangie) and Carl (Willis) and that's one thing we really concentrate on is staying in that delivery because it's all about staying relaxed and repeating your delivery, especially for me," Wright said. "I think because I'm getting more years of doing it, more reps of doing it, it's becoming easier for me to make an adjustment pitch to pitch."

From the sixth through the ninth, he registered four of his seven strikeouts, while dipping as low as 59 miles per hour on his low-speed knuckleball to keep the Baltimore bats off balance.

"I think in that inning they scored the two runs I got caught up in the same speed," Wright said. "I went out there after that and really concentrated on not throwing too many of the same speeds because really it throws them off. Then it lets me get away with if I leave one up, hopefully the difference in speed will leave them out front."

"I thought today he had probably the best touch with changing speed," manager John Farrell said. "He threw the slow knuckleball a number of times to really keep people off strides. We could talk all day about him. An outstanding performance on his part."

Follow MassLive.com Red Sox beat reporter @jcmccaffrey on Twitter. She can be reached by email at jmccaffr@masslive.com.