The Boston Red Sox spent most of Sunday night one out away from a disaster. Then they flipped it completely.
Down to their last strike in the tenth inning against Yankees reliever Fernando Cruz, the Red Sox bats finally woke up. Three runs crossed the plate in the bottom of the tenth, turning a 4-2 deficit into a 5-4 walk-off win. Four-game sweep. Dirty Water blasting over the Fenway speakers. And a whole lot of exhaling in the Boston dugout.
Gray’s Almost-Perfect Night
Sonny Gray was the story for seven-plus innings. The Red Sox starter carried a no-hitter into the eighth, completely shutting down a Yankees lineup that had been hot all weekend. He struck out nine. He walked two. He looked every bit the ace Boston traded for.
Then Amed Rosario broke it up with a clean single in the eighth. That one hit opened the floodgates. The Yankees scratched across two runs in the ninth, with Anthony Volpe scoring the tying run on a fielder’s choice. David Bednar came in and slammed the door in the bottom of the ninth, sending the game to extras.
Extra-Inning Chaos
The tenth inning was a mess in the best way. The Yankees grabbed two runs on a passed ball and a sacrifice fly, giving them a 4-2 cushion. That felt like enough against a Red Sox offense that had gone quiet for three innings.
It wasn’t.
Boston loaded the bases with nobody out in the bottom of the tenth. A walk. A hit-by-pitch. A single. Cruz couldn’t find the zone, and the Red Sox made him pay. A bases-loaded walk cut the lead to one. Then another walk tied it. And with the stadium shaking, Jarren Duran shot a single through the right side to score the winning run.
Duran had been 0-for-4 to that point. He picked the right time to change that.
“I just wanted to get the barrel to something,” Duran said after the game. “He threw me a slider down and I got enough of it.”
The Red Sox are now 6-2 against the Yankees this season. That’s not nothing in a division where every game feels like a playoff preview. Boston heads to Toronto next. New York goes home to lick some wounds after letting a sweep get away in the worst possible way.
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