Aug. 16—By the time Boston was finished with New York last time out, the Yankees were in shambles.
New York left town trailing Boston by nine games in the AL East standings, and after the Yankees saw a near no-hitter slip away in the July 25 series finale, fans in the Bronx started experiencing all seven stages of grief at once.
People were furious, calls for manager Aaron Boone and longtime GM Brian Cashman’s jobs reached a fever pitch, and while the Bronx burned, Red Sox Nation turned its attention to Tampa Bay.
The Yankees, for this year at least, looked finished.
But as the great college football commentator Lee Corso likes to say, “Not so fast, my friends!”
Since that weekend in Boston everything has changed. The Red Sox fell into a tailspin and rapidly lost ground in the AL East and AL Wild Card standings, while the Yankees moved aggressively at the trade deadline and erased nearly all the distance between them and Boston.
Now, what could have been a relatively drama-free week in the Bronx is shaping up to be another pivotal moment for the Red Sox.
“It’s a good team and we knew at one point they were going to play good baseball,” said Red Sox manager Alex Cora. “They did what they did the last few weeks, it seems like we’re playing better so it should be fun on Tuesday.”
Heading into this week the Red Sox own a 2.5-game lead over the Yankees, who have won 14 of 19 since that last matchup at Fenway Park.
If Boston takes the three-game set at Yankee Stadium, the Red Sox will effectively keep the Yankees at arm’s length in the Wild Card race. But if not? It’s possible Boston could leave New York looking up at the Yankees in the standings and on the wrong side of the playoff bubble.
The Yankees won’t look anything like the club that came to Fenway Park in late July either.
When we last met New York, the club was riddled with injuries and dealing with the fallout of a significant COVID-19 outbreak. Aaron Judge, Kyle Higashioka, Gio Urshela and others weren’t in the lineup, leaving the Yankees with five regulars and a rotating cast of reserves and Triple-A stopgaps to fill the bottom of the order.
The Yankees aren’t quite at full strength this time either, but they look a lot more formidable than that B Team outfit. For one, Boston will now have to contend with Joey Gallo, one of baseball’s best power hitters who the Yankees acquired at the trade deadline along with first baseman Anthony Rizzo. Rizzo is out after testing positive for COVID-19 following a monster start in New York, as is Gary Sanchez, but Judge and Higashioka are both back.
New York could get a huge lift to its rotation, as starters Gerrit Cole and Jordan Montgomery both rejoined the club prior to the Field of Dreams game in Iowa last week. Cole and Montgomery were added to the COVID-19 list on Aug. 3 but may be activated ahead of the Red Sox series.
Even if the Yankees are much improved, the Red Sox are a different team now too.
Boston heads to New York riding the high of an emotional and dominant weekend at Fenway Park, and the Red Sox are now at full strength for the first time this season. Chris Sale is back, Kyle Schwarber is in the lineup and even injured utility man Christian Arroyo may be on the verge of a return.
For everything that’s changed, one thing is for sure. The rivalry is back on, and what happens on Tuesday and Wednesday could set the tone for the rest of the year.
Email: mcerullo@northofboston.com. Twitter: @MacCerullo.
UMass lab report: Sox-Yanks No. 1 rivalry again
It usually goes without saying that the Red Sox and Yankees are baseball’s biggest rivals, but according to experts who actually study rivalries across society, Boston and New York had fallen from their perch.
According to David Tyler, associate professor at UMass Amherst’s Mark H. McCormack Department of Sport Management and co-founder of Know Rivalry Lab, the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants had — for a time — ranked No. 1 in their Top 10 Most Intense MLB Rivalries rankings.
But the Red Sox and Yankees have now re-taken the top spot!
Boston teams rank No. 1 in three of the four major professional sports leagues’ most intense rivalry rankings on KnowRivalry.com. The Celtics and Lakers are the NBA’s biggest rivalry and the Bruins and Canadiens the NHL’s most intense.
The Patriots and Jets rank No. 4 in the NFL, behind the Saints and Falcons, Bears and Packers and Ravens and Steelers.