Maxbialystock

Perez gets a huge break--because the wheels were definitely coming off. The Sox lineup, on the other hand, continues to grovel at Germain's feet.

Excellent point.

Cordero is absolutely clueless at the plate.

It sure was, but three hitters too late.

That's the thing, right there. The Yankees get a break, an opportunity, and jump on it. Not with a dinger, but with a little old single that with 2 outs brings a run home. They did that 4 times last night.

2 walks can never be good even assuming Perez gets Odor out.

Except for being injury-prone, he is kind of amazing in how well he plays right field (at his height).

Duran's OPS continues to go up and down like a yo-yo. Early days. Unlike the more experienced Dalbec, he has a better notion of where the strike zone is. Kind of amazing he is batting 2d and Verdugo has been dropped to 6th, so today the lefty bats are again 2d, 4th, and 6th. Oh, and Cordero 9th (if that means anything).

Perez a little lucky on that line out by Sanchez, but those two K's were impressive.

Sox won game 1 even with Ottavino coughing up 2 runs, then beat Cole in game 2 when our starter, ERod, left after getting just 3 outs and leaving 2 on and no outs in the 2d, but lost last night when Ottavino again gave up 2 runs. My small take is this is just another excellent Yankees-Sox series even with the Yankees having a down year. And now Perez coughs up a leadoff double, after which he K's Giancarlo Stanton.

Bette Davis (as Margo Channing in All About Eve): fasten your seat belts; it's going to be a bumpy night. That describes this season and a big chunk of the games and game threads.

Perhaps his contract was OK. Eating innings every 5th day is the best thing I've read on this thread about Porcello, and I agree that has value. And in fact he ate the most innings among the Sox rotation in 2018, probably the best season in Sox history. He was also decent--3 starts, 1 win, 15.1 innings, ERA 3.52--in the 2018 postseason. Meanwhile, Price went 26 innings, ERA 3.45, Eovaldi 22.1 innings ERA 1.61, and Sale 15.1 innings, ERA 4.11).

The more I look at his stats and read about him, the more I am convinced he was just different from the other guys. He was intelligent and a student of the game and virtually his entire focus was on hitting. He had great eyesight and reflexes. He came to MLB when day games, in which hitters prosper more than pitchers, were normal and later decried the emphasis on night baseball. I think David Ortiz was somewhat like Williams--a lefty hitter who definitely preferred to pull the ball, even at Fenway with the deep right field. His career OPS was a terrific .931, and, outdoing Williams in just one respect, his final season, 2016, age 40 (his 41st birthday was in November), his OPS was an unbelievable 1.021. He think he was helped by his willingness to learn how to hit to the opposite field. Reportedly, Adrian Gonzalez worked with him.

Ted Williams notwithstanding, I agree with you.

Welcome back! Verdugo has gone so often to the left that they don't shift much for him. Those who don't go opposite field follow the trail set by the one and only Ted Williams who believed that hard contact--not necessarily for a dinger--was the way to beat the shift. His 39th birthday was August 30, 1957, the season he hit .388, one of the highest averages anyone has had since he hit .406 in 1941. That said, Williams was a dead pull hitter and no doubt believed "don't mess with success." I do disagree with you about Barnes for two reasons. First, I think he is excellent this year and certainly good enough to close in the postseason. Second, you have clearly forgotten 2018 when Kimbrel was a horrible closer (ERA 5.91) in the postseason--but the Sox still took 3 of 4 from the Yankees, 4 of 5 from the Astros, and 4 of 5 from the Dodgers. I do not believe the Sox have ever had a better manager of the bullpen than the guy they have now. Kimbrel was a disaster in the 2018 postseason, but Cora found a way to work with and around him, including sometimes leaving him in while us guys on Talksox were screaming to kill him.

Eovaldi pitched like an ace today, but the Sox only scored 1 earned run. All 4 of the Yankee runs were earned. Ottavino has so far pitched 7.1 innings in July and given up 5 earned runs for an ERA of 6.1. He has, if anything, been worse than that because he gave up 2 runs in Thursday's game, which the Sox won in the 10th. And today he came into the 8th with 1 man on and 2 outs, and allowed the Yankees to score 3 runs to go ahead. He is a much better reliever than Andriese, but in his last two games he has been worse than Andriese.

Need a new guy to set up for Barnes. Ottavino needs a break.

FWIW, a good throw by Odor gets Hernandez at 3b. So the gamble worked.

That's 14 pitches per inning.

Great call by Plawecki (or Eovaldi) on that final strike for the swinging K. Solid 1st for Eovaldi. Credit to Gardner for just making contact to get that single.

Recently the bottom third of the order has done well, but not Plawecki or Cordero.

Based on what I said, it's a fair criticism that I don't appreciate how hard MLB pitching is. But in fact I do and have expatiated on the topic in the past. A MLB starter has to have the accuracy of a professional knife thrower--but at four times the distance--and the strength to throw it really hard, the skill to throw different kinds of breaking balls, and the endurance to do it 80-120 times per start. And you're right: Porcello did all those things. But in my view he never had even one good pitch that was really hard to hit, so he had to rely on mixing his pitches, which kind of worked, but he lacked the kind of command that got guys out. Thus his career OPS Against was .750, and in his five years (2015-2019) with the Sox his OPS's against were .787, .635 (his Cy Young year), .826, .698, and .809.

I don't like Vazquez one darn bit. He's stopped hitting, he needs to stop taking chances on the basepaths, he leads MLB in passed balls with 9 (next worst only has 5), and he's overweight. However, I think one reason why the pitching staff--and last night is a perfect example--has exceeded expectations has to be that Vazquez knows what he is doing behind the plate. So, yeah, I'm fine with more Plawecki or even Wong (who looks great behind the plate--no passed balls and very few if any wild pitches). But I think Cora likes Vazquez out there and maybe for good reason.

Devers currently has the 11th best WAR, 3.8, in the AL and the 8th best OPS, .939. He's also tied with Guerrero for most rbi's, 79. His DWAR is +.2.