Yankees and Dutchies in MLB, Saturday May 2
After Friday’s unexpected win (with C.C. Sabathia on the mound), the Yankees sent Nathan Eovaldi to the mound on Saturday.
Besides the fourth inning, in which he gave up a lead off solo homerun to Dustin Pedroia, Eovaldi wasn’t really in trouble. In that same inning he gave up singles to David Ortiz and Pablo Sandoval but then got help from his infield when Mike Napoli grounded into a 6-4-3 double play in which Didi Gregorius tossed the ball out off his glove to Gregorio Petit for the first out of that double play. Didi played a good game overall. He went 1 for 2 as he singled in the top of the third and scored on a double by Brett Gardner. Didi also laid down a sacrifice bunt towards Pablo Sandoval in the top of the fifth. Chase Headly and Gregorio Petit both advanced to scoring position. Eventually both scored on Brett Gardner’s single towards left field. The Red Sox cut the Yankees’ lead in half in the seventh inning as Chris Martin, who replaced Eovaldi in that inning, gave up an RBI double to Mookie Betts. In the ninth inning Chris Young hit a solo homerun that cleared the Green Monster for the much needed insurance run. Eventually Dellin Betances took over in the eighth inning as he replaced Justin Wilson with two outs and retired the four remaining batters that he faced for the save. One of them was Xander Bogaerts, who went 0 for 4 with a strikeout.
Nathan Eovaldi lasted 6.2 innings and allowed two earned runs on seven hits. He struck out two and walked one and clinched his second win of the season.
With the Red Sox winning two in New York and the Yankees winning two in Boston, you can wonder what the value of the home field advantage is.
Despite Andrelton Simmons’ great game, the Braves couldn’t not turn their slide. In their last ten games, the Braves are 3-7. Yesterday they fell 4-8 to the Reds. Andrelton collected two basehits out of two at bats (one of them an RBI double) and drew two walks. He drove in one run and scored two himself. While being at second base as a base runner in the bottom of the seventh inning, Andrelton was struck by a hard grounder hit by Jace Peterson.