Yankees takeaways from Saturday's 3-1 win against Red Sox, including strong pitching and timely hitting
The Yankees evened the series against the Boston Red Sox with a 3-1 win on Saturday night in the Bronx.
Here are the takeaways...
- Boston’s starter Tanner Houck befuddled the Yankees the first time through the order, retiring the first nine batters he faced and fanning six of them, including striking out the side in the bottom of the third inning.
So, what did New York do the second time through? Well, Gleyber Torres jumped him on the first pitch he threw in the inning for a solo shot that gave the Yanks a 1-0 lead.
- On the other side of the ball, Domingo German matched Houck pitch for pitch, keeping Boston at bay for the first five innings. But much like Torres in the fourth, Rafael Devers unloaded on the first pitch he saw from German in the sixth inning and deposited it to the netting out beyond the center-field wall to tie the game at 1-1.
Aside from the Devers home run, German pitched brilliantly in his six innings of work, giving up just the one run on six hits, two walks and striking out five. Over his last seven starts, the righty owns a 2.20 ERA.
- Despite leaving in a tie game, German was in line for the win after Willie Calhoun’s home run in the bottom of the sixth inning gave New York the lead once again. With two outs and nobody on, Calhoun took Houck deep on a ball that just went over the right-field wall, spoiling the righty's strong outing.
- Wandy Peralta was the first pitcher to come out of the bullpen and after two quick groundouts, the lefty walked back-to-back hitters (including one to Masataka Yoshida in an at-bat that lasted 14 pitches) to bring up the dangerous Devers. With the lefty-on-lefty matchup, Peralta got Devers to ground out to end the inning unharmed.
- The Yanks got an insurance run in the seventh after pinch-hitter Isiah Kiner-Falefa singled off reliever Brennan Bernardino to lead off the inning, advanced to second on a groundout and came around to score on Kyle Higashioka’s two-out single.
- Tommy Kahnle pitched a scoreless eighth inning and Clay Holmes finished things off with a scoreless ninth to get the save and even this rivalry series.
Highlights
What's next
The Yankees and Red Sox play another night game on Sunday at 7:10 p.m. for Sunday Night Baseball.
RHP Clarke Schmidt (2-6, 4.96 ERA) will take on RHP Brayan Bello (3-4, 3.97 ERA).
