The script was familiar: hand the opponents a big lead early, and fail to catch up.
The Yankees raced out to a 5-0 edge after two innings and went on give the Red Sox a 5-2 defeat.
Zack Godley allowed a tape-measure solo homer in the first, then yielded a grand slam to Gio Urshela in the second.
Boston relievers tossed 4.2 scoreless innings, but it was too late.
The only two runs came on a double by Xander Bogaerts. The Red Sox had just two hits after the third inning.
WHO: Red Sox (3-5) vs. New York Yankees (5-1)
WHEN: 7:07 p.m.
WHERE: Yankee Stadium
SERIES TO DATE: Yankees, 1-0
STARTING PITCHERS: RHP Zack Godley (0-0, 0.00) vs. RHP Masahiro Tanaka (2020 debut)
TV/RADIO: FOX; WEEI 93.7 FM
LINEUPS
RED SOX
Benintendi LF
Pillar DH
Devers 3B
Bogaerts SS
Moreland 1B
Vazquez C
Verdugo RF
Bradley CF
Lin 2B
YANKEES
LeMahieu 2B
Judge RF
Torres SS
Stanton DH
Voit 1B
Tauchman LF
Sanchez C
Urshela 3B
Gardner CF
IN-GAME OBSERVATIONS:
9:49 Lack of hustle there for Devers, who sliced a ball to left, but somehow, didn't get a double out of it.
9:26 Ordinarily, I enjoy John Smoltz's analysis. But man, tonight, he's uttering one ridiculous thing after another. He believes someone is going to hit 30 homers this year, keeps talking about the Yankees winning more than 40 games and thinks "there'a good chance'' that some reliever ("I'm talking about 20-25 appearances'') could go unscored upon for the season. What the....??
9:14 Super play by Urhsela, who backhands a ball on the third base line, and gets enough on a throw to nab Christian Vazquez at first
8:55 Just three runs scored by the Red Sox in the 14 innings of this series to date.
8:37 That's it for Godley, who gives up five runs in 3.1 innings and is responsible for two baserunners. Chris Mazza in.
8:24 Alex Verdugo has traditionally hit lefties well, but he looked clueless in that at-bat against Luis Avilan.
8:04 Two-run double for Bogaerts to right-center, who just missed a three-run homer by a few inches. Alert baserunning by Kevin Pillar, who had stopped at third initially, but advanced home when the throw to second base got away momentarily.
7:50 Terrific play by Xander Bogaerts, who scoops a slow roller and fires to first to just nab D.J. LeMahieu -- with some help from Mitch Moreland, who picks a low throw, backhanded.
7:48 In 10 innings in this series, the Yankees have hit five homers.
7:44 The inning has gotten away from Godley in a hurry -- three straight singles and a grand slam from Gio Urshela, and the Yanks lead suddenly 5-0. Unlike the juicy curveball to Judge, this wasn't a terrible pitch - a changeup at the bottom of the zone.
7:27 For all the issues the Red Sox have had with teams beating their infield shifts, they were perfectly situated for Gleyber Torres there, with Tzu-Wei Lin stationed behind the second base bag.
7:24 Zack Godley flashed a good curveball in his last outing, but he hung a fat one up in the zone and Aaron Judge positively crushed it -- deep to left.
PRE-GAME NOTES:
- Ron Roenicke termed the loss of Eduardo Rodriguez for the remainder of the season ''very difficult. We hope this thing heals up and next year, we have the same great pitcher...To lose an entire season is pretty tough for anybody.''
- The Red Sox announce mid-game that catcher Jonathan Lucroy, who was designated for assignment earlier in the week, cleared waivers and will report to the team's alternate training site in Pawtucket.
- The Sox haven't officially said who will start for them in the series finale Sunday night, when they'll use an opener. "It depends a little bit on what happens (Saturday),'' Roenicke said. "We know who we think we're going to start with, but how we proceed after that, depends on how today goes.''
- J.D. Martinez, in the middle of a 2-for-23 rut, got the night off. Said Roenicke: "I listen to the players and sometimes when I ask them how they're doing and if they need a day, if it makes sense to do it, (I will). I'm hoping by doing this then maybe we'll get the next two months that are really good from him. They're hard decisions because we know how important all these games are.''
- Kevin Pillar served in the DH spot with Martinez off for the night.
- Amid all the cancellations throughout MLB, Roenicke said his staff is trying to keep the players focused on the task of hand. "You try to keep them with their routines,'' said Roenicke, "just so they can focus on going out on the field not just playing the game, but playing to win. That's the challenge that we have.''
- On the spreading of the virus and the threat to the season, reliever Matt Barnes knows there's room for improvement all around. "It's definitely a difficult situation,'' said Barnes, "I think we knew coming into the season that nothing about it was going to be easy and to play 60 games and get through a postseason is going to take a lot of sacrifices on everybody's part. I think there are some people who have made some poor decisions off the field and we can always get better at that and get better at what we do on the field. Listen, I'm not perfect and I don't think anybody's been perfect. But if there's anything we can kind of be better at, having seen what's happened in the league and understand that if we don't do a better job, this may very get shut down. It's on the players, it's on the league, it's on every organization. It's a full, collective effort and everybody needs to do a better job and really tighten it up so we can get a 60 game season and a postseason in.''
- WHAT'S UP: The Sox are 2-1 on the road so far and since the start of 2019, have a .571 winning percentage (48-36) which ranks them tied for fifth in the majors in that span...The Sox lead the AL in average (.264) and doubles (18) and are fourth in OPS (.753)....Christian Vazquez is still tied for the major league home run lead with four and ranks tied for the second in the AL with eight RBI and tied for third in total bases...He's also thrown out three base-stealers, tying him with Jason Castro of the Angels in that department....Michael Chavis hit hit 19th career homer in his 100th game Friday night....He has four in 14 career games against the Yankees and has homered in each of last two games at Yankee Stadium, dating back to last season...He's the 11th Red Sox player to hit 19 homers in his first 100 games with the team. Will Middlebrooks was the last do it....Tonight marks the first career appearance in Yankee Stadium for Zack Godley.