Red Sox reply to latest big Yankees comeback
Martinez, Ramirez power Boston victory
NEW YORK — Alex Cora watched the New York Yankees erase a late deficit for the second straight night, and the Boston Red Sox manager wasn’t surprised.
“For them, it’s fun to watch,” he said. “For me, it’s like, oh God, here we go again.”
This time, the Red Sox rebounded for a win that seemed more important than most.
J.D. Martinez hit a tiebreaking home run against Dellin Betances leading off the eighth inning, just beyond Aaron Judge’s reach at the right-field wall, and the Red Sox escaped New York with a 5-4 victory Thursday that handed the Yankees their second loss in 19 games.
“Definitely huge,” Martinez said. “Kind of hoping that we can almost slow them down in a sense.”
Boston moved back into a tie with the Yankees for the American League East lead at 26-11, the majors’ best record. The rivals have split six games this year and meet 13 more times but not until June 29 in the Bronx.
“You walk off there disappointed but also proud of the way the guys continue to compete through the end and give ourselves a chance on a night when maybe it doesn’t look that way,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.
Boston built a 4-0 lead against CC Sabathia as Hanley Ramirez drove in three runs with a groundout in the first, an RBI single in a two-run third and a homer in the fifth just before a 55-minute rain delay.
But the Yankees tied the score in the seventh after loading the bases with one out against Heath Hembree.
Joe Kelly (2-0), who served a six-game suspension for hitting the Yankees’ Tyler Austin with a pitch last month, was booed loudly when he entered.
Kelly forced in a run with a fourpitch walk to Brett Gardner and gave up an RBI single to Judge and a run-scoring groundout to Didi Gregorius, who is hitless in 24 at-bats.
Martinez had driven in a run in the third with a liner off second baseman Gleyber Torres’ glove that was turned into a forceout, and as he walked to the plate in the eighth, Ramirez told him to hit a home run.
“He was saying it as a joke,” Martinez remembered.
No joke. Martinez sent a 97 mph fastball from Betances (1-2) to the opposite field, just over Judge’s outstretched glove.
Judge reached over the fence, and a spectator’s glove touched his. But the ball clearly was over the wall, and Martinez circled the bases with his ninth home run.
Austin flied out on the first pitch he saw from Kelly with a runner on in the eighth. Kelly threw a called third strike past Neil Walker to end the inning with two on — the seventh Yankees batter caught looking as New York repeatedly questioned the strike zone of plate umpire Stu Scheurwater.