Here’s an early look at the reheated Red Sox-Yankees rivalry
The Red Sox and Yankees met on March 3 for a game played in a miniature of Fenway Park by teams that represented a small-scale imitation of the rivalry to come in 2018.
The Yankees won 5-3 at JetBlue Park in Fort Myers, but neither Giancarlo Stanton nor Aaron Judge made the trip south from New York’s spring training home in Tampa. The two sluggers likely won’t miss the clubs’ next meeting, in Boston on April 10, when the sides finally bring the competition to the diamond after an arms race over the winter.
In 2017, the Sox finished 93-69 and captured the AL East title, while their pinstriped rivals settled for second place, a 91-71 record, and a spot in the wild-card playoff. There are plenty of new faces in both dugouts heading into the regular season. The offseason additions are expected to lift the rivalry back to the level of last year’s pennant race and beyond to its early-aughts heights.
Here’s an early look at how the new-look Red Sox and Yankees match up:
In the dugout
Both Boston and New York moved on from their managers after postseason runs last year. The Sox replaced John Farrell with Alex Cora, while the Yankees hired Aaron Boone (infamous for sending a 2003 Tim Wakefield knuckleball skyward) to replace Joe Girardi. Boone and Cora worked together at ESPN after wrapping up their playing careers, but now they’re back in uniform and back on opposite sides of the Sox-Yankees rivalry.
“The two fan bases, through the offseason, they got what they wanted,” Cora said. “One team got it early, the other one did it late but we are where we are and it should be fun.”
Cora has more experience than his former colleague, with one campaign under his belt as the Astros’ bench coach, but he’ll be suiting up as manager for the first time on Opening Day as well. Cora won a World Series with Boston in 2007 and picked up a second ring with Houston last year.
Boone, a third-generation major leaguer, is managing a baseball team for the first time after 12 years as an infielder and eight more in the booth as an analyst. His transition should be eased by the presence of Luis Servino and Aroldis Chapman on the roster.
Yankees general manager Brian Cashman suggested that Boone’s team, with a payroll north of $190 million, was ‘The Little Engine That Could.’
“I look at them as the defending American League East champions,” Cashman said of the Red Sox. “We have to find a way to close the gap on them. They just added another piece to improve on what they already had.”
At the plate
Last season, MLB set a new single-season home run record across the league, and the Yankees topped the team charts with 241 long balls. The Sox were on the opposite end of the spectrum, finishing dead last with 168. In December, New York added Stanton, the NL MVP, to a lineup that already included Judge, the AL Rookie of the Year, Gary Sanchez, and Didi Gregorius. Those four players alone combined for 169 home runs last season. Boston didn’t to make their splash in the free agent market until late February, but if J.D. Martinez replicates his 2017 performance (.303 BA, 45 HR) he’ll be well worth the wait.
Cora said that Mookie Betts and Andrew Benintendi will lead off the lineup with Martinez batting either third or fourth. The consensus among Sox reporters says the rest of the lineup will look like: Hanley Ramirez, Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Eduardo Nunez, Christian Vazquez, and Jackie Bradley Jr.
FanGraphs predicts that lineup, plus the hitters on the bench, will produce 27.7 Wins Above Replacement in 2018. That’s good enough for third-best in the majors, three spots ahead of the Yankees’ 26.4 WAR.
In New York, the top six spots in the lineup are expected to be filled by some combination of Judge, Stanton, Sanchez, Gregorius, Brett Gardner, and Greg Bird. Brandon Drury, Aaron Hicks, and Ronald Torreyes should bat seven through nine.
The Martinez signing proved the difference in the overall projections. After the Stanton trade, the Yankees were expected to finish the season one win ahead of the Sox but with Martinez on board the projected win totals are even at 93.
The Sox new slugger said he’s not worried about the comparisons between him and Stanton.
“No I don’t worry about that stuff,” Martinez told WEEI.com. “He’s going to get his, I’m going to get mine. It’s not a competition…You can’t worry about what other guys are doing, what other teams are doing. It doesn’t matter. You can’t control that. You just have to control your day for what it is.”
On the mound
Corey Kluber of the Cleveland Indians won the 2017 AL Cy Young award. Boston’s Chris Sale looked likely to claim the 2017 AL Cy Young award for most of the year but faded down the stretch to finish second place in the voting, just ahead of New York’s Luis Servino in third.
Sale’s 308 strikeouts were the first time an AL pitcher reached the 300 mark since Pedro Martinez in 1999. He posted a 2.90 ERA on the way to a 17-8 record. Servino countered that with a 2.98 ERA and 14-6 record.
Beyond the two aces, the Sox will roll out David Price, Rick Porcello, Eduardo Rodriguez, Steven Wright, and Drew Pomeranz, while the Yankees send C.C. Sabathia, Masahiro Tanaka, Sonny Gray, and Jordan Montgomery to the mound.
Porcello and Price both have Cy Young awards in their back pockets, but neither played at that level in the postseason as the Sox fell to the Astros in the divisional round. Still, with two Cy Young winners and ace that finished runner-up the Sox should be well-placed to face the Bombers’ loaded lineup.
Price, who spent 93 games last year on the disabled list and didn’t crack the rotation in the playoffs, gave the reporters what they wanted to hear when asked about the time-honored rivalry.
“Sure, yeah,” Price said, smiling. “You guys want it. Let’s do it. We hate the Yankees. We hate the Yankees. Hate ’em!”
What experts are saying about the rivalry
Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
Hurley broke down the potential matchups position by position, and wrote that “strictly from a numbers perspective, the Yankees have the edge at six spots, while the Red Sox have the edge at five.”
But some of those gaps are more considerable than others. Betts may end up having a better overall season than Judge, Martinez’s impact with Boston may neutralize Stanton’s impact with New York more than many might imagine, and certainly, nothing in the Red Sox’ rotation is a guarantee — especially any expectation involving David Price…What’s clear is that on paper, these two teams look about as even as can be at this point in the year.
Chad Finn, Boston.com
Know why I really can’t get on board with the premature proclamation of the next Yankees dynasty? Because the two-time defending American League East champion Red Sox are still better and will remain that way for the foreseeable future.
Catcher Gary Sanchez – 33 homers last year and 53 in 177 career games – would be the most feared slugger in most lineups, but pitchers can practically exhale when getting to him after navigating Stanton and Judge. The Yankees also have more power than the Red Sox in the hard-throwing arms of their bullpen.The Yankees have a lot going for them. Just not quite as much as the Red Sox.
Brendan Kuty, NJ.com
While the Yankees’ lineup is better, the Red Sox have the leg up in the rotation. While the Yankees’ bullpen is better, Boston’s bench is far and away sturdier. It’s going to come down to which team escapes the season with the less injury problems. But the Yankees are the better overall team, by a little, because of the addition of Giancarlo Stanton and the lights-out bullpen back end.
Mike Lupica, MLB.com
There were a lot of years after that when the Yankees and Red Sox had taken upper-case letters away from their rivalry, and we all tried too hard to still make it something it was not. But this season could be different, as the two teams do something very risky for win-now teams coming off seasons when they both won a lot, but not enough: Bring new managers into the thing. Yankees general manager Brian Cashman, in particular, has placed an awfully big bet on himself by replacing Girardi — who replaced Joe Torre — with Boone, who has never managed anywhere.
“What this shows,” Cashman said Friday, “is that [both the Yankees and Red Sox] are not afraid to make very difficult decisions when trying to be the best we can be.”
First-time managers. Old-time rivalry. Upper-case again.
