Tonight is a night that many baseball fans dream of: a New York Yankees versus Boston Red Sox winner-take-all elimination game. For the 25 million people who live in the new York City and Boston metro areas, it really doesn’t get much better than this. So far, this AL Wild Card series has delivered on its promise with two incredible games that went down to the wire.
The rubber match will begin at 8:08 p.m. ET at Yankee Stadium. It’ll be a battle of rookies: Cam Schlittler will toe the rubber for New York, while Boston will counter with Connelly Early.
Let’s break down this matchup with some odds and lines at DraftKings Sportsbook.
Boston Red Sox at New York Yankees prediction, preview
The prior 15 games that these teams have played this season — 10 of which have been won by the Red Sox — matter very little entering tonight’s game. Each team’s 164 games this season come down to the nine innings still to come tonight. So far this series, pitching has been the story, despite the Yankees’ high-powered offense finishing with the highest OPS and ISO this season, as Boston has scored six runs and New York has scored five. After using just two pitchers in Game 1 — Garrett Crochet and Aroldis Chapman — the Red Sox emptied out the bullpen in Game 2 after Brayan Bello lasted just 2.1 innings. The Yankees have the better-rested relief corps, as Max Fried and Carlos Rodón have combined for 12.1 innings, but it’s also worse; the series would be over had Luke Weaver and his 4.74 career ERA not entered Game 1.
New York should feel good as long as Schlittler is in the game: the 24-year-old, who hails from the Boston suburb of Walpole, has recorded a 2.96 ERA across his first 14 career starts, and he has gotten better and better as his season has gone on, pitching to a 2.47 mark after the start of August. It’s not like he never has bad starts — in fact, his worst career outing came at home against an AL East playoff team in the top-seeded Toronto Blue Jays — but banking on a guy who’s given up two or fewer runs in 10 of his 14 starts and gotten at least one out in the sixth inning seven times is a good position to be in. Advanced numbers are fairly kind to him; though he issues too many free passes, the Red Sox have walked at a below-average rate over the last month. They also struggle to get the ball in the air, which should mitigate his 20th-percentile ground ball rate.
Early has been even better as a rookie, but the sample size is much smaller: four starts. He’s allowed two or fewer earned runs in each of them, but he’s never completed the sixth inning nor thrown more than 90 pitches, so it’s possible that Boston will have to turn to its bullpen earlier than the Yankees for the second straight night. Still, the underlying numbers are really, really good: he’d rank in the league’s top quartile in every Statcast category except for fastball velocity and hard hit percentage if he’d pitched enough innings to qualify, and his 2.28 expected ERA is somehow even better than his actual 2.33 mark. The fact that he pairs below-average velocity with below-average spin may mean he’ll start to struggle eventually if his command slips even slightly, but there have been no indications that regression is on the horizon.
Boston Red Sox at New York Yankees pick, best bet
Best Bet: Boston Red Sox Moneyline (+129)
I picked New York at the beginning of this series, but it hasn’t looked all that comfortable offensively, Aaron Boone has made some questionable management decisions, and its bullpen still looks vulnerable. Early’s 0.91 FIP and .378 batting average on balls in play indicate that he actually should be performing better than he has. Schlittler’s FIP and xERA both lag far behind his actual mark.
Strong Lean: Masataka Yoshida 1+ Singles (-111)
Yoshida drove in the game-winning runs in Game 1 on a pinch-hit single against Weaver and singled again against Fernando Cruz last night. He should finally get the chance to start with a right-hander on the mound. The 32-year-old has posted a .967 OPS in the last two weeks and has also been pretty good against power pitchers like Schlittler, slashing .269/.310/.404 in 58 plate appearances against them this season.
