The Red Sox lost a close one to the rival Yankees by a score of 3-2 on a night where the ball just wouldn’t bounce the Sox’ way.

Lefties were hitting .275 against Justin Masterson coming into the game, so the Yankees started 9 lefties against him. He managed to turn in a quality start, despite looking downright wild at times, missing spots badly and giving up two hits to Carlos Beltran, who came in hitting .162. But he was able to limit damage by inducing a healthy amount of groundouts and his final line was such:

Boston	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA
Masterson	6.0+	6	2	2	3	2	0	4.71

His third walk was the costliest, walking the number 9 hitter Didi Gregorius, who came in hitting .206 and was 0-2 at that point in the game. Didi would come around to score the game-tying run.

It was frustrating that the Red Sox only managed 2 runs off of Sabathia. CC was 0-6 with a 6.13 ERA over his last 7 starts (dating back to last season). Even when the Sox made outs, no one looked particularly fooled or off-balance. A lot of comfortable at-bats ended in outs. As Eck said, CC only had “mediocre gas.” (Eck’s baseball phrases are the silver lining of the games that Jerry can’t do. Eck is great, but he doesn’t have the same chemistry with Orsillo that Jerry does.)

Tangent: I don’t get people who don’t like baseball or think it’s boring. Sabathia and Masterson were far from dominant tonight, yet the game was low-scoring, which is usually the type of game people groan about the most. But it was still fun to see the starters play chess with the hitters. Every single curveball thrown is cool to me. A guy is throwing a ball with so much torque and velocity that the ball breaks sharply over the course of 60 feet and 6 inches, and ends up where he wants it, within a fraction of a second.

Anyway, A-Rod hit the game winning home run on a center-cut, 3-0 fastball from Tazawa in the bottom of the 8th. It was the 660th of his career, tying him with Willie Mays for 4th all-time. It was one of those weird baseball moments where you could sense what was coming before it happened. Because it was his first at-bat of the game, Don and Eck were talking about how Rodriguez’s next homer would be #660, and when Taz fell behind 3-0 you knew A-Roid was going to have the green light. After he hit it Eck was salty, mentioning that Willie Mays was his hero growing up. He said A-Rod “cheated” on a 3-0 fastball, and that anyone could do that. Which is kind of true, but irrelevant, and this one was a laser, leaving the yard at 116.3 MPH. It was the first pinch-hit homerun of his career.

Offensive Highlights:

In Napoli‘s first two ABs it looked like he was still bailing early on pitches. His front shoulder and hips were clearing the zone way too early. In his 3rd at-bat Nap’s front side finally stayed closed, allowing him to drive the ball to right-center with authority for a ground rule double. The bounce was unfortunate because had the ball stayed in the yard, Hanley would have scored from first.

Panda had another ball that hit high off the Monster go for a single. This one was his second hit from the right side of the plate in 2015. He also had a nice turn to start a double play while he was positioned between the second baseman and the first baseman on a shift (I know that’s not an offensive highlight).

Xander has been featuring a slightly more open stance of late and it worked for him tonight. He saw a lot of pitches, while doubling, and drawing a walk.

Allen Craig homered! Nothing about it was pretty. He hit a fastball, but looked like he was swinging at something offspeed, and it barely cleared the wall, but I’ll take it and I’m sure Craig will too. He struck out looking on fastballs in his other two at-bats, but still. A big step in the right direction.

Ryan Hanigan:

Hanigan has been consistently putting together impressive at-bats. His first was an 11-pitch affair ending in him hitting a frozen rope that Jacoby Ellsbury had to catch over-the-shoulder in deep centerfield. Jacoby is probably one of only four or five guys in the league who make that catch. In the 4th Hanigan had another great AB that ended in a double. It should’ve been an RBI double but some jackass reached out and tried to catch it, forcing Bogaerts to go back to 3rd base, where he would be stranded. The “fan” was ejected for interfering with a ball in play, but the worst part of the whole affair was that it was an absolute can of corn, a room service hop that was just reaching the top of its arc when it hit the guy’s glove, and he dropped it.

Then Hanigan got hit in the hand again (say that out loud!). In the top of the 7th Tommy Layne hit Teixeira in the hand with an 0-2 pitch, and the ball ricocheted directly onto Hanigan’s hand. This was a fluky play, but my God. When the hell is Hanigan going to learn to put his hand behind his leg or back? He’s already gotten hit on his throwing hand a bunch of times this year; you’d think he’d be more conscious about his hand positioning. That’s one of the first things I tell my little leaguers when they get behind the dish.

You knew it was going to be bad when Ryan had to leave the game. All of the other times he’s been hit he’s stayed in. It turns out that Hanigan suffered a fracture to his 5th metatarsal (according to Farrell), and will need surgery. This is a huge loss. As we just discussed, he’s been having great at-bats and getting on base at a good clip. He’s also been lauded as a stabilizing force for the pitching staff.

He’ll definitely be missed, but at the same time, how stabilizing could he be if the staff had the worst ERA in league? Would they have been that much worse without him? Again, this is a big loss. But I don’t think it’s catastrophic.

My first thought after hearing “surgery” was “Salty is a free agent.” Despite his throwing issues in the 2013 World Series, I’d still welcome him back with open arms. My second thought was “it’s Swihart time.” By the end of the night, the general consensus was that Blake would be called up for tomorrow’s game. That doesn’t mean they won’t continue to explore external options, but it’s exciting news in the mean time, even though it comes at a cost.

Notes:

-Don Orsillo is always so smudge about his closed broadcasting booth protecting him from “the elements.” NESN will pan to the rest of the broadcasters looking like they’re going skating on the Frog Pond in February, and Don is sitting in there with the window closed wearing just his suit.

-A-Rod has almost come full circle for me. I’ve liked him and despised him, and now I’m just kind of ambivalent about him. Now there are so many Yankees fans hating him that I kind of want him to do well. In some alternate universe, 15-year-old Righty is losing his mind.

-Sox in April: 113 runs – 3rd in MLB … 91 walks – 1st in MLB … 5.04 ERA – last in MLB.

-I guess the Yankees are allowed to grow facial hair now? Most of the starters had mustaches. From what I hear, Brett Gardner started the trend. Wonder how The Boss felt about ‘staches?

-There were some half-hearted boos for Stephen Drew in his first at-bat. I imagine some drunk dude named Sully sitting in the right-centerfield bleachers recognized his name, and the fact that he used to play for the Sox and is now on the Yankees, and booed reflexively.