It feels redundant to say the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox are playing a poignant series this week. When you consider they have been biblical baseball foes for a century -- in fact, it's been 100 years since the Sox sold Babe Ruth to the Yanks -- and the subsequent curse finally snapped at the Yankees' expense in 2004, this four-game set feels intensely familiar.
The teams with the two best records in baseball have played nine games. The Yankees have won five. The Bombers have averaged 5.4 runs while Boston has pounded out 5.9 runs per game. Boston added Ian Kinsler and Nathan Eovaldi to their club before the non-waiver trade deadline. The Yankees added Zack Britton and J.A. Happ.
Boston is tops MLB in runs scored and hits, and doubles. The Yanks lead the sport in home runs, slugging percentage, and OPS. Each club sports a fledgeling major-league manager in Alex Cora and Aaron Boone, who are shining in their maiden seasons. You can decide if they are conducting a fine baseball orchestra or are merely penciling in their robust rosters.
But in the brass tax department, the Red Sox (75-34) are in first place, 5 1/2 games ahead of the Yanks (68-38) in the AL East. The Yanks didn't do themselves any justice losing to the cellar-bathing Baltimore Orioles in the Bronx yesterday. Still, the Bombers have dug out of larger holes later in the season against the Sox, but this lead feels a little more daunting. Not because the Yankees aren't good enough, but because Boston has that magic mojo thing going in 2018.
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Both clubs are bubbling over with talent. Boston has a conga line of twenty-something studs, from Mookie Betts to Xander Bogaerts to Jackie Bradley Jr. The Yankees trot out the only two real candidates for Rookie of the Year, in Miguel Andujar and Gleyber Torres. (Aaron Judge will miss the series because of a broken wrist.) Both can score in droves. The Yankees have the best bullpen on the planet, while Boston has a more sturdy rotation. The games are at Fenway Park, but since they play each other so many times every year baseball doesn't have a distinct karmic or climatic home-field edge the way football does.
But this would be a good time for the Yankees to pounce. Red Sox ace Chris Sale is on the DL. And while his Yankees counterpart, Luis Severino, has had some bumpy outings lately, Masahiro Tanaka has hurled over 17 scoreless innings.
The pitching match-ups are at least a coin flip, if not a narrow edge for the Bombers. The first game features CC Sabathia ( 6-4, 3.53 ERA) against Brian Johnson (1-3, 3.45 ERA). The second game pits Severino (14-4, 2.94 ERA) against Rick Porcello (13-4, 4.03 ERA). Saturday's starters are Happ (11-6, 4.05 ERA) versus Eovaldi (4-4, 3.80 ERA). The Sunday night finale has Tanaka (9-2, 3.84 ERA) squaring off against David Price (11-6, 3.97 ERA).
Boston can't lose their grip on the division no matter what happens. If they win at least two games, they have to consider the series a success, especially if they pad their lead. The Yankees want to win three of these four to inch two games closer in the standings, knowing that if they don't win the AL East - they would be in first place anywhere else in MLB - they will be shoved into a one-game, wild card crucible, which they would likely play at home, but also know they could tossed out of the 2018 playoffs in nine quick innings.
No matter who's hunting or the hunted, this always feels right. Not just the teams involved. Not just the scalding contempt each team's fans have for each other. Not just as as a rite of late summer. All of it. In sports you often hear that certain bedrock ball clubs are good for a given game. The Cowboys in the NFL; the Lakers in the NBA; and these two clubs in MLB jousting for playoff positioning is great for our pastime.
The Yankees may not have spent much of the last century gawking upward at the Red Sox. But that has been an awkward reality since Boston broke that hex in 2004. Regardless, you can invert the order but the baseball cosmos are in place when these two teams play for something more than pride, as they seem to do almost every year.
Follow Jason on Twitter at @JasonKeidel
FROM BEHIND ENEMY LINES (From WEEI In Boston)
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