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Carrie Stroup here with your Red Sox vs. Yankees betting line courtesy of Sportsbook.ag.
BOSTON RED SOX (2-1) at NEW YORK YANKEES (1-2)
Sportsbook.ag Line: Boston -110, Total: 8
A long standing rivalry between the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees kicks off a new season when they meet in the Bronx this Friday night.
Boston kicked off the new season with a solid series against the Phillies, winning 2-of-3 games as they scored 16 runs. They earned the series win on Thursday night in a 6-2 contest where they managed to get 11 hits and just one going for extra bases. What they did do well is string together hits when needed and had all of their runs come in a strong third inning where the timely triple by Xander Bogaerts (.364) scored three runs.
The Yanks didn’t fare quite as well in their opening series against the Blue Jays as they scored a mere eight runs over the three games, winning just one. They had 17 hits in the series and were unable to get their runners in during a 6-3 loss on Thursday night; going 1-for-9 with RISP. Some good signs came out of the defeat, though, with both 1B Mark Teixeira (.200) and DH Alex Rodriguez (.222) leaving the yard for the first time this year.
Getting the start in this classic matchup will be LHP Wade Miley (8-12, 4.34 ERA in 2014) for the Red Sox as he goes toe-to-toe with RHP Nathan Eovaldi (6-14, 4.37 ERA in 2014) of New York. Of course, this series has always been one to watch and the Yankees have been the better of the two in the previous three seasons, going 31-25 (.554) against their division rivals as they are 15-14 (.517) in the Bronx. The injury report has closer Koji Uehara (Hamstring) still out for Boston while New York is not dealing with any omissions to its lineup.
Miley had plenty of success as a member of the Arizona Diamondbacks, compiling a 26-21 record between 2012 and 2013 before going just 8-12 last year. He had a 4.34 ERA in that down season, but upped his strikeouts from 6.5 K/9 to 8.2 K/9. With the increased strikeout ability, Miley saw his walks jump to 3.4 BB/9 and the control issues translated to batters getting 1.03 HR/9 off of him. He has faced the Yankees just once and he earned a no-decision behind 6.2 innings of work, giving up three runs on four hits with three strikeouts. As a result he’s had little experience against any of the Yankees batters with 3B Chase Headley having the most at-bats (17) as he’s tallied only three hits with four strikeouts.
Other than that, C Brian McCann is the only player on the club to get more than a hit, going 2-for-3 with a RBI. The bullpen only needed to be on the mound for seven innings in the first series of the year, allowing one earned run behind two hits allowed and six strikeouts.
They have not needed to close out any games just yet, but if they do it will go to Junichi Tazawa (0.00 ERA, 0 saves) who has pitched one perfect inning in a non-save situation this year.
Just like his counterpart in this one, Eovaldi will be making his first start with a new team after spending the past four seasons with the Dodgers and Marlins. The results have been mixed for the 25-year-old, as he has a poor 15-35 (.300) career record, but has just over a 4.00 ERA (4.07 ERA) and is coming off a campaign with Miami where he allowed a mere 1.9 BB/9 and gave up just 0.63 HR/9. Some of his problems last year stemmed from batters hitting an unsustainable .323 BABIP against him as his fielder independent pitching (FIP) was 3.37. He has yet to face this Red Sox team in his short career, but two of Boston’s newest members, 3B Pablo Sandoval and OF Hanley Ramirez, have had a field day against New York’s newest starter, combining to go 10-for-16 (.625) with four doubles, two HRs and 12 RBIs. The only player who has had at-bats against him and hasn’t done well is OF Allen Craig who is hitless with a walk in his two times at the plate against the righty.
The relievers for the Yankees have pitched 11.1 IP so far, allowing three runs (2 ER) on three hits with a 6:5 K/BB ratio. Closer Andrew Miller (0.00 ERA, 1 save) was great in his first appearance on Wednesday, getting the save on just 11 pitches with one strikeout.
- Carrie Stroup, Gambling911.com Senior Reporter
