Red Sox shut out Yankees behind dominant pitching performance by Brayan Bello

On Friday, Brayan Bello outperformed Yankees ace Max Fried on the mound, leading the Red Sox to a 1-0 victory at Yankee Stadium.

Bello tossed seven scoreless innings, allowing three hits, one walk, and five strikeouts; as a result, the Red Sox won the season series against New York, moved into second place in the AL East, and became the top team in the AL wild card standings. The Red Sox improved to 7-1 against the Yankees this season.

By clinching the season series, the Red Sox will own the tiebreaker over the Yankees if they finish with the same record.

The 26-year-old improved to 10-6 on the year, and he lowered his ERA to 3.07, throwing 92 pitches, 61 for strikes, in the outing. In two starts this season against the Yankees, Bello has not allowed a run in 14 innings. He is the first pitcher in Red Sox history to go seven or more innings and allow three or fewer hits in consecutive games against the Yankees, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

“What he usually does here. He enjoys this stage,” said Alex Cora about Bello on Friday night. “I even thought about him going out in the eighth, but then I hesitated… He did more than enough. Every pitch counted tonight.”

Bello and Fried benefited from home-plate umpire Lance Barrett’s strike zone. In the first inning, Bello got three straight strike calls to Aaron Judge, who saw four pitches, all out of the zone, and was called out looking. Bello settled into his outing in the second and third innings, getting quick outs and avoiding long at-bats, which has plagued the young right-hander this season.

Boston put a run on the scoreboard after Fried exited the game after tossing six scoreless innings, giving up four hits with three walks and seven strikeouts.

Nathaniel Lowe, who is beginning to become a clutch bat since joining the Red Sox, belted a one-out double, which set up a Connor Wong RBI double into the left field corner. Wong’s double was his fifth this season, and he now has six RBI. Five of Wong’s six RBI have come in the month of August.

“He’s a good offensive player,“ said Cora. ”He was hitting the ball hard before the injury. He got injured. Carlos (Narváez) did his thing and he became a backup. He’s been a pro the whole time. Working hard on his defense. Offensively, too. Playing once a week but lately he has been playing a lot and you can see the results.”

In four games since signing with Boston, Lowe is 3-for-10 with two doubles, a homer, four RBIs and three runs scored.

“I was telling Bres that his WAR went up the last few days,” said Cora. “We joke about stuff like that here. We saw an opportunity to improve that position and so far, so good.”

Alex Bregman has been productive at the plate in his first two games as a member of the Red Sox against the Yankees. Bregman went 3-for-4 in the win and has now had back-to-back three-hit games for the sixth time in his big league career. The last time he accomplished that feat was in May 2021.

Friday night’s hero, Roman Anthony, went 0-for-3 versus Fried and 0-for-4 on the night. Anthony was initially to start in right field, but 25 minutes before the game, Cora changed the Sox’ defensive alignment. Rookie Jhostynxon Garcia, who made his Major League debut, started in right field, Nate Eaton slid to center field, and Anthony was penciled in at DH.

Garcia (0-for-3) struck out three times and walked once in his first game. In his second at-bat, play was briefly interrupted by a squirrel. The frisky critter got close to Garcia as he was stepping into the batter’s box and then danced on the mound as Fried stepped off.

The other big story of the game was the dominance of the Red Sox bullpen for the second straight night. Garrett Whitlock and Aroldis Chapman made quick work of the Yankees. Whitlock needed just 14 pitches in a 1-2-3 eighth inning, striking out Anthony Volpe and pinch-hitter Giancarlo Stanton. Yankees fans rained down boos on Chapman as he entered the game and got some stellar defense from David Hamilton, who made a wonderful sliding play to open the ninth. The All-Star closer dominated the game by striking out Trent Grisham and Ben Rice.

With the Sox bullpen pitching lights out the last two games, they will be getting another starter who’ll be turned into a reliever in the coming days. Boston will remove Walker Buehler from the starting rotation and move the righty to the bullpen. This comes after a poor first season with the Red Sox, where he posted a 5.40 ERA and a career-high 4.4 walks-per-nine-innings rate in 22 starts.

“I talked to him last night. (Craig Breslow) did too,” said Cora. “This is his new role. We’ll figure out how it goes, maybe one inning, multiple innings, whatever it is, we don’t know yet... Whenever he’s ready, he’ll be there, and he’ll help us out.

Buehler handled the news like a professional.

“He has been very frustrated with the way he has pitched,” the manager said. “I still believe in him. He’s a big part of what we’re trying to accomplish.”

Boston has a chance to win the four-game series on Saturday with their ace on the mound. NESN will broadcast the first pitch between Garrett Crochet (13-5, 2.43 ERA) and Will Warren (7-5, 4.25 ERA).