Friday night for the New York Yankees, it was a long and winding road for their ninth win in a row, this time against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. After playing clean baseball and scoring 43 runs in three games against the Blue Jays, last night may have been a wake-up call that brought the Yankees back down to reality.
The Yankees did not play well, the game saw the Yankees commit three errors. Yankee pitching allowed the Red Sox to run on them, and the Yankees lineup remained dormant for the first six innings of the game. The result was that at the end of six innings the Yankee trailed the Boston Red Sox 4-0. The main culprit was the lousy starting pitching of Yankee starter Jordan Montgomery who struggled mightily. Montgomery gave up four runs on five hits while still having a respectable seven strikeouts. Montgomery who has pitched well this season will want to forget this one.
The offense remained quiet for the first six innings, and the Yankee fearsome threesome of Judge, Stanton, and Voit combined for just three hits in the game and one RBI. The Red Sox’s Martin Perez pitched a brilliant game against a strong Yankee lineup, sprinkling in just three hits and walk, while string out seven Yankees. While the Yankees had some sloppy play, the Boston defense made some sparkling defensive plays in the game.
The stars of the game for the New York Yankees were, of course, DJ LeMahieu, Jonathan Loaisiga, but the surprise name on the star list was Gary Sanchez. I seldom praise Sanchez, but other than a minor flaw defensively, it was overshadowed by some amazing defense for Sanchez. In the seventh inning, Sanchez had a long double, into the right-field stands, allowing the Yankees to finally get on the board as two runs scored. At the bottom of the ninth with the Yankees still behind by two runs, Sanchez again came through with a significant home run to left over the Green Monster scoring two and tying up the game and causing it to go into extra innings. Gary Sanchez is the only reason the Yankees won this ninth game in a row.
Although starting pitcher Jordan Montgomery faltered, the Yankee bullpen was brilliant. Luis Cessa came in for 1.1 innings, he allowed two hits but kept the Sox from scoring. Adam Ottavino’s swerve was working, allowing only one hit in his inning. Zack Britton pitched a clean inning. Chad Green was dominant in his inning, while striking out two. Aroldis Chapman struggled with his velocity down, but got out of the tenth inning, striking out two. The pitching star of the game was Jonathan Loaisiga, who pitched the eleventh and twelfth innings, allowing just one hit, while striking out two Red Sox.
The New York Yankees’ offense finally got going in the seventh inning, with Gary Sanchez’s two-run double. At the bottom of the eighth inning, Giancarlo Stanton took one to the left-field wall scoring Aaron Judge who motored home all the way from first base, and the Yankees were just one run shy of tying the game. Then came Sanchez’s solo homer in the ninth to tie the game and bring it into extra innings.
At the bottom of the eleventh inning, Luke Voit who had been silent in the game hit a double scoring Mike Tauchman who had previously been brought in to run for Stanton, for the Yankees first lead of the game. But in the bottom of the frame, Christain Arroyo put the ball in play driving in a run and retying the game at 5. The eleventh inning was a long one with Loaisiga loading the bases, but Loaisiga battled and got our of the inning without allowing the Red Sox to take the lead.
At the top of the twelfth with Yankees on the corners, DJ LeMahieu stepped to the plate and drove in Aaron Hicks from third, for the Yankee 6-5 lead. At the bottom of the frame, Loaisiga on the bump again, he got the win keeping the Red Sox scoreless in the frame. Loaisiga got the win for the Yankees, Ryan Weber took the loss for the Red Sox. The final score was 6-5 in twelve long innings. The game time was just over five hours.
Although this wasn’t the best game for the New York Yankees, it shows the great team that they are. Down four runs, they came all the way back to get the win. It was the Yankees’ eighth straight win over the Red Sox this season. Tonight at 7:30 pm, J.A. Happ will be on the mound for the Yankees, as they try for their tenth win in a row.