The Yankees had a big win on Saturday afternoon against the Red Sox
The Yankees had a much needed 14–4 win over the Red Sox on Saturday afternoon at Yankee Stadium to end their 4-game losing streak. They lost the first game of the series 5–3 after getting swept at home by the Reds.
Yankees rookie first baseman Ben Rice was the standout performer from Saturday’s game. He went 3–5 with three homers and seven RBI after having one homer and five RBI in his first 15 MLB games. He is the first rookie in Yankees franchise history to have three home runs in one game.
Rice was born in Cohasset, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. He grew up a Yankees fan despite being around Red Sox fans (including his family). It’s extra special that he became first Yankees rookie to hit three homers in a game against the Red Sox since the grew up in Red Sox territory among many Red Sox fans.
“It’s a historical day, a magical day,” Gerrit Cole said about Rice. “To be honest, I’m pretty thankful that I get to be on the lineup card because I know he will remember it forever.”
He now has an impressive .294 average (15–51) , a .383 OBP, a .972 OPS, three doubles, four homers and 12 RBI in his 17 MLB games. In his last 12 games, he is 13–40 (.325) with six walks, eight runs scored and has raised his OBP from .333 to a very good .383 and his OPS from .548 to .972. The 25-year-old had a .393 OBP in 60 games in the minors this season and he now has a .383 OBP in 17 games at the MLB level this season, which means his ability to get on base at a high rate has continued. He has not looked overmatched at all with the Yankees.
Two of his three home runs went 406 and his three homers travelled a total distance of 1,202 feet. He got a curtain call from the fans at Yankee Stadium after his third home run and he was confused about where to go. This was his third game as the leadoff hitter and he has four homers in those three games after not hitting a homer in his first 13 MLB games. He also has seven extra base hits in his last seven games after not having an extra base hit in his first nine MLB games.
“Swing at pitches in the zone an go up there looking to do damage.” Rice said after the game when talking about what his strategy at the plate is. “That’s a moment I’ll never forget.”
Rice was responsible and drove in seven of the team’s 14 runs. Juan Soto was the only hitter in the starting lineup who did not have a hit. Rice, Aaron Judge, Alex Verdugo, Oswaldo Cabrera and DJ LeMahieu all had a multi-hit game.
Cole started the game and was not his best like he was in his previous start when he allowed one run in five innings. In this start he allowed four earned runs with two walks, seven hits and a homer in 4.1 innings pitched.
Cole throws his knuckle curve 12 percent of the time and got a strikeout on it in the first inning on Saturday. He retired the side in order in the first. Rafael Devers had a .316 average with seven of his 12 hits being homers in his career against Cole coming into this game.
Devers, who has dominated Cole and the Yankees in his career, had an RBI single off of Cole in the 3rd inning and hit a homer off of Cole in the 5th inning that landed just above the bullpen. That was Cole’s last batter. If you take away Devers’s two RBI off of Cole, he would have had a solid performance. Cole should have pitched around or walked Devers due to how well he has hit against him.
Rice struck out with the bases loaded to end the 2nd second inning, when it seemed like the Yankees might be on their way to another loss.
Jose Trevino airmailed a throw to second on a steal that Oswaldo Cabrera had no chance at catching in the third inning. Masataka Yoshida hit a bloop weakly hit RBI single to very shallow left for an RBI with the bases loaded in the 3rd. That hit was Cole’s 63rd pitch, which is a high pitch count for the third inning. Catcher Reese McGuire then had a weakly hit single that went deeper in left for another RBI single. Cole threw 27 pitches in the 3rd inning. Cole bounced back and struck out the side in 4th inning.
Trevino was on third with one out but DJ LeMahieu could not hit the ball to the outfield to get him home. LeMahieu has been hitting an alarming amount of ground balls this season. This game was a positive overall for LeMahieiu since he had just his second multi-hit game of his season and now has five hits in his last six games after having six hits in his previous 14 games. However, both of his hits were singles and he now has just two extra base hits in his 31 games this season.
After Devers’s homer off of Cole, the score was 4–3 Reds Sox but then the Yankees would score 11 unanswered runs to win the game 14–4.
Rice led off the game with a homer into the second deck near the foul pole off a cutter that didn’t cut. The Yankees did not score again until the third inning when Verdugo hit a 2-run homer to tie the score at three. Verdugo’s homer that went into Monument Park was his first homer since June 14 (also against his former team). Since that homer against the Red Sox in the middle of June, he went 11-68 (.162).
Volpe had a big RBI ground rule double to tie the game at four in the fifth. The Yankees got unlucky since two runs would have scored if the ball did not bounce over the wall. The Yankees scored their next three runs in the fifth inning off of a Austin Wells pinch hit bases loaded walk, an Oswaldo Cabrera sacrifice fly and a LeMahieu RBI single.
Rice had a no doubt about it homer in the 5th to make the score 10–4 Yankees for his second homer of the day and 3rd in last three games. Rice should play everyday and it should not matter if a lefty is pitching. The Yankees scored seven runs in the fifth inning after scoring just nine runs combined in the previous three games. They scored more runs in this game (14) than they scored in their previous four games (13).
Rice hit another no doubt abut it homer in the 7th inning. His three homers that he hit in this game are more homers than LeMahieu, Jon Berti and Jahmai Jones have hit combined in their 82 games this season. Rice (25 years, 135 days) is the youngest Yankee with a three-homer game since Bobby Murcer on June 24, 1970 against the Cleveland Indians.
Murcer played 13 of his 17 MLB seasons with the Yankees and was a five-time All-Star and one time Gold Glover winner with the Yankees. In 1971, he led the league with an impressive .427 OBP, a .969 OPS and a 181 OPS+. The next seasons he led the league with 102 runs scored and had a career-high 33 homers. Murcer’s 33 home runs were the most by a Yankee centerfielder since Mickey Mantle hit 35 in 1964. No Yankee center fielder topped that mark until 2011 when Curtis Granderson hit 41.
He was a Yankees broadcaster on WPIX, the radio (WNYW) and the YES Network for most of two decades. He called David Cone’s 1999 perfect game.
Rice needed the fifth fewest games in MLB history to get to his 3-homer game. It took Rice 17 games and Aristedes Aquino needed just 10 games to get to his 3-homer game on 8/10/19. Aquino would hit 19 homers in 56 games for the Reds in 2019.
The Yankees won this game against the Red Sox and now have a chance to win the series. If they win on Sunday it would be their first series win since they won three out of four against the Royals June 10–13. They had gone 5–15 since June 12 before this win against Boston.
