Boston Red Sox Drop Opening Game Against New York Yankees 8-1
By Zachary McMahon –
The Boston Red Sox played their rival New York Yankees in the opening game of the weekend series on Friday night in the long awaited return of Alex Verdugo to Fenway Park. Dugie returned in a big way, welcoming the fans of Fenway with a two-run blast in the first inning.
The game was originally supposed to start at 6:30 pm, which changed from their original time at 7:10 to accommodate Game 4 of the NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and the Dallas Mavericks. However, the start of the game was delayed for an hour and 10 minutes due to rain in Boston.
Brayan Bello started for the Sox, where he had a crucial error in the fourth that would bring Giancarlo Stanton home as he dropped the transfer from first baseman Dominic Smith that would’ve got out Oswaldo Cabrera.
Enmanuel Valdez was able to bring in Boston’s first and what would be their only run of the game on a RBI double in the fourth that brought Rafael Devers home. This is Valdez’s third straight game with an RBI double, and it was Devers’s third straight game where he scored a run.
Meanwhile, Dugie struck again with an RBI double in the fifth that brought home Anthony Volpe off Bello, and then Anthony Rizzo brought Aaron Judge home on an RBI single off Cam Booser, who just came in for Bello at that point. Booser was able to groundout Gleyber Torres to end the inning.
The Boston Red Sox had two walks in each the fifth and sixth innings, but were unable to get a hit together to bring the runners home to cut the deficit as they were down 5-1 at the point. Zack Kelly pitched two innings, and struck out the side in the fifth and did not allow any hits in the sixth.
Chase Anderson pitched the final two innings for the Sox, and had a strong eighth inning as he struck out Stanton and Rizzo, and flied out Torres, but got hit hard in the ninth, as Jose Trevino hit a solo homer into the Monster seats, and then Judge hit a RBI Double, and then scored on a error by Tyler O’Neill on a single by Verdugo as the Yankees extended their lead to 8-1.
Michael Tonkin, who struck out Bobby Dalbec for the final out in the eighth, stayed in the ninth and walked Jarren Duran, but was able to shut down the Sox after striking out O’Neill for the final out of the game, as the Yankees take the first game of the series by the score of 8-1.
The Red Sox offense surrendered 14 strikeouts to the Yankees pitching staff, which included starter Luis Gill, who struck out six in five innings, and Caleb Ferguson having four strikeouts as all of his outs in 1 ⅓ innings, as he struck out all three batters in the seventh. This is the seventh time this season that the Sox have surrendered 14+ strikeouts in a game, with a high of 15 strikeouts in the April 2 win against the Oakland Athletics.
They are 3-4 in that stretch, as they
have lost the last three games with 14 strikeouts. This is the sixth series out of the last seven that they have lost the first game, as the only win was last weekend’s series against the Chicago White Sox as they won the opening game on Thursday before losing the next two, and winning the finale, thus splitting the series at two apiece.
Alex Verdugo went 3-for-5 in his return to Fenway, as he was a triple away from the cycle with a single, double, and a home run. Soto went 1-for-4 with a double, a walk and two runs scored as he played in his first game at Fenway Park in a Yankees uniform. He played at Fenway in 2020 as a member of the Washington Nationals.
The Sox and the Yankees will play on FOX on Saturday night at 7:10 p.m. It will be Cooper Criswell going up against Carlos Rodon.
