All you need to know, in quickie form, about the Red Sox' 9-2 loss to the Yankees, complete with BSJ analysis and insight:
BOX SCORE
HEADLINES
Sale loses his cool ... and the game: Chris Sale was definitely victimized by home plate umpire Mike Estabrook, who missed a handful of pitches early in the game. But Sale didn't help himself, either. Instead of bucking up and getting himself out of some jams, he seemed to lose his composure. Sale was upset about a pitch that Estabrook missed against Gio Urshela, but after getting a popup from the next hitter he faced, Sale surrendered five straight hits, resulting in five more runs being scored in the fateful fourth inning. On the day of a doubleheader, when his team needed him to provide length, Sale seemed to get distracted by some missed calls, leading to a seven-run inning for the Yankees, and soon after, his own removal from the game. "I've got to stay locked in, no matter what outside factors are coming in,'' he said. Sale also suggested that he had been the victim of some bad luck. "It seems like every mistake I make gets capitalized on by the other side,'' he said. But when you have a 4.68 ERA in August, misfortune only plays a small role.
https://twitter.com/EricCasey/status/1157728291001966593
Lineup goes down without a fight: On Friday night, the Sox managed just three hits. In the first game Saturday, things were only slightly better, with a total of five hits. The Sox scored two runs -- one on a solo homer from Andrew Benintendi and another from Jackie Bradley Jr.-- but over the second half of the game, with the outcome all but assured, the Red Sox seemed to be giving away at-bats. After Bradley led off the fifth with a homer to right field, the Red Sox went down 1-2-3 in the rest of the inning ... and every inning after that. Starter Domingo German retired the last nine hitters he faced and Jonathan Holder got the only six hitters he faced, in the eighth and ninth, in order. Worse, the Sox didn't look they were putting up much of a fight. The last nine outs by German came n just 31 pitches while Holder threw only 21 pitches to record six outs over the final two frames. "It seems like, offensively, we've slowed down the last couple of days,'' said manager Alex Cora.
Smith saves the pen: It says all you need to know about the day that perhaps the star of the game for the Red Sox was long reliever Josh Smith. Smith was summoned from Pawtucket on Friday to take the roster spot of Heath Hembree, who went on the IL with a recurrence of the elbow issues that dogged him earlier this summer. Taking over after Sale was chased in the fourth -- Marcus Walden got the last out in that inning -- Smith gave the Red Sox four strong innings, allowing just one run on four hits. Yes, by the time he took the mound, the game was out of hand. But at least he kept things respectable by throwing strikes and getting through the Yankee lineup almost unscathed. More than anything, he allowed Cora to stay away from the rest of his relievers, many of whom will likely be pressed into duty with spot starter Brian Johnson scheduled to make his first start since June 22.
TURNING POINT
As rough as things seemed for Sale in the fourth inning, with two on, he was an out away from getting out of the inning after getting Cameron Maybin to pop to second. But then the parade of hits against him -- five in a row, four of them producing runs -- began and the game was put out of reach by the Yankees.
ONE UP
Andrew Benintendi: Benintendi continues to swing the hottest bat in the lineup with his fourth multi-hit game in the last six games, including a solo homer.
ONE DOWN
Brock Holt: Holt was hitless in three plate appearances and was unable to get to some balls hit to the right side which got to the outfield.
QUOTE OF NOTE
"It's hard enough playing this game as it is. You give these guys extra outs and it's going to hurt. I felt like he kind of changed the landscape of the game. There's got to be something done about this." Chris Sale on home plate umpire Mike Estabrook.
STATISTICALLY SPEAKING
- The Red Sox are just 1-6 in the Bronx this season.
- The Sox have lost three straight games on the road, dating back to their last trip.
- The ejection for Alex Cora was his second this season.
- Chris Sale is 0-4 with a 9.90 ERA against the Yankees this season.