Red Sox bats again let down dominant Sale

BOSTON — Chris Sale played the part of Yankeekiller once again Thursday night in every way but one: he took the loss.

The Red Sox lefty dazzled the Yankees for much of the first eight innings at Fenway Park, but faltered in the ninth in a 3-0 Yankee victory.

Afterwards, he refused to blame a lack of run support— even though the Red Sox have scored just four runs for Sale in his 37 2/3 innings on the mound.

Instead, he admitted the obvious. He wasn’t as good as Masahiro Tanaka.

“The moral of the story is I just got flat-out outpitched,” Sale said. “That’s it.”

True, but he still managed to overmatch Yankee hitters for much of the night.

Sale retired nine of the first 10 batters he faced, striking out seven before the giving up an unearned run in the fourth. After being removed after eight shutout innings in his previous outing, Sale came out for the ninth having thrown 103 pitches Thursday — and gave up three straight hits.

“I felt great,’’ Sale said. “I wanted [the ninth] bad. I didn’t want to say anything, but I wanted to go out there. … You can’t go out there and want the ninth inning and do that. It’s just unacceptable.”

Aaron Hicks, Chase Headley and Matt Holliday finally chased Sale in the final inning as the Yankees added a pair of runs.

“We have a chance in the ninth and I just completely took the wind out of our sails,” said Sale, who added he didn’t talk to manager John Farrell about staying in the game. “I’m pretty sure they knew I wanted it. You can’t let it blow up on you.”

Despite Sale’s harsh selfassessment, he still gave up just two earned runs in eight-plus innings, while striking out 10. His career ERA against the Yankees went up to 1.31 in 11 games (eight starts), which is the second lowest mark by any pitcher since 1913, behind only Eddie Watt (1.29) for a pitcher who has thrown at least 50 innings against them.