Sox come as advertised vs. Yanks
Offense and Eovaldi were on full display, but flawed bullpen exposed in Opening Day loss
NEW YORK — Welcome back to the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry as we remembered it.
In a rematch of last year’s American League Wild Card Game, the American League East rivals picked up right where they left off with a back-and-forth Opening Day marathon that didn’t disappoint.
After waiting out a lockout that erased baseball from our memories for the better part of the winter, the sport returned with a bang on Friday, when the Yankees outlasted the Red Sox for a 6-5 walk-off win in 11 innings.
“It was a good baseball game,” Sox manager Alex Cora said.
Opening Day positions us for easy over-reactions, but this Opening Day game stuck to the script and left us no other choice.
The Red Sox looked exactly like the team we thought they’d be, with one glaring concern: a bullpen that has just one reliever who can be counted on and no assigned roles.
Nathan Eovaldi was sharp but threw just 76 pitches, down from the 89 pitches he threw on Opening Day last year. It’s to be expected as teams don’t often let their starters go deep into games anymore. But Eovaldi was averaging 98 mph, 2 mph harder than his season average last year, and touching 100 mph. Clearly, arm strength wasn’t an issue.
And if the bullpen is going to be a problem, those innings need to come from somewhere; maybe the starters need to be extended.
Eovaldi finished with five strong innings while piling up seven strikeouts and allowing three runs on a pair of homers from Anthony Rizzo and Giancarlo Stanton. The Rizzo blast was a no-doubter, as Eovaldi made a decent pitch on the outer half but Rizzo yanked it to his pull-side and sent it a long way. The Stanton homer was less egregious, as Eovaldi tried going up and outside but Stanton’s long arms and easy power connected to send a line-drive home run that barely climbed the short porch in right field.
As far as Opening Day starters are concerned, Eovaldi can compete with anyone (if he’s healthy).
“He got into trouble little there but the velo was good, the offspeed pitches were really good,” Cora said.
Garrett Whitlock is still nasty, as he showed when he relieved Eovaldi in the sixth inning and threw 2 1/3 innings while striking out four, but he made a single mistake to D.J. LeMahieu, who clobbered a high fastball for a game-tying home run in the bottom of the eighth.
The Red Sox entered the season hoping that Whitlock’s presence could eliminate some concerns in the bullpen, where the Sox are without another lockdown reliever.
It was also revealed after the game that last year’s closer, Matt Barnes, is out with back tightness and was not available. The Sox tried their two new lefthanders, Matt Strahm and Jake Diekman. Strahm did his job but Deikman allowed a pair of baserunners in the 10th that led to the Yankees tying the game. Hansel Robles was strong in his debut. But Cora ran out of options and went to rookie Kutter Crawford, the surprise of spring training who was making just his third career big league appearance in the 11th inning.
Crawford threw just three pitches before Josh Donaldson hit a dribbler up the middle that scored the ghost runner from second base and ended the game to the sound of Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” at Yankee Stadium.
Cora said he wanted to save Whitlock for Tuesday, when he was planning to use the star reliever behind fifth starter Rich
Hill, but extended Whitlock to try to win this game.
It’s hard to argue that logic, but the Sox are simply short on talented relievers.
As usual, the Red Sox offense should be mighty dangerous. After Kiké Hernandez drew a leadoff walk against Gerrit Cole, Rafael Devers lifted a two-run homer into right field for the Sox’ first long ball of the year. And in doing so, Devers became the first Sox player ever to hit a home run in his final at-bat of the previous season and in his first at-bat of a new season.
Xander Bogaerts, fresh off declining the Sox’ last contract offer, had a three-hit performance to lead the offense, though he exited in the 11th inning due to hamstring tightness and his prognosis is uncertain.
Overall this looks like the Red Sox team we thought they’d be.
The rotation has top-end talent, the offense can hit and the defense was much better, but the bullpen will be a question mark as this back-and-forth Opening Day game reminded us.
“The fans love it,” Cora said of the extra-innings excitement. “They love it… If you think about it as a baseball fan, I know people sometimes don’t like this but there was a lot of stuff that went on from the 10th inning on. Pinch running, pinch hitting, walking guys, mixing and matching. You don’t see that often. From the 10th inning on, it was all a blast.”