Red Sox Nation, we should’ve known our starting rotation was too good to be true. Overpaid, oversensitive (to criticism and allergens, apparently) David Price proved that with his abysmal start against the Yankees tonight. I scoured the dictionary, and there actually wasn’t even a word bad enough for his performance tonight. Price even joked last week that he would be skipping another start against the Yankees, but now the joke’s on us.
After going 7-1 in his last nine starts, Price was overdue for a terrible game. Unfortunately for the Sox, it came at the worst possible time, against the Yankees and their ace, Severino.
Price began his night giving up homers to Aaron Judge and Gleybar Torres in the 1st. Another homer to Aaron Hicks in the 2nd would make the score 6-0. After a scoreless third, Price gave up two more home runs to Hicks (who would have a third later in the game) and backup catcher Kyle Higashioka, his first Major League hit after going 0-for-25. That was it for Price, who exited after just 3 1/3 innings. It was his first starting appearance ever in which he allowed four or more home runs. He gave up nine hits overall.
The Red Sox bats didn’t answer back until the 9th, when they put a single run on the board before finally falling, 11-1 and dropping the series.
We haven’t heard from Price postgame yet, and it’ll be interesting to see if he talks about negativity or tries to blame yet another mild ailment or actually owns his crap for once.
David Price’s career ERA vs. Yanks as a Red Sox is now 8.43 ER with 44 earned runs – 13 of them homers – given up over 47 innings. He’s 2-6 against them, but 0-5 with a 10.44 ERA in five starts at Yankee Stadium. He’s only the second Sox pitcher ever to allow five home runs against the Yankees in New York. In a sick twist of fate, Dennis Eckersley did it first on July 1, 1979.
Regardless, I don’t really think it matters. The issues are clear: David Price cannot pitch against the Yankees, and the Red Sox do not have one successful postseason starter. His performances against teams like the Orioles are irrelevant; sure, they pad the win column, but Baltimore is an astonishingly-bad 31.5 games out of first. They won’t make it into the postseason, and will be lucky to finish the season with 80 wins. We need Price to be able to pitch against teams like the Yankees, and he can’t, rendering him effectively useless to us. In two starts against the Yankees this season, he’s somehow allowed 12 runs on 12 hits — six of them homers — in just 4⅓ innings.
The Sox and Yankees have been within 2½ games of each other atop the division since May 1, a full two months. They’ll face each other 11 more times, including six games in the final two weeks of the season. It’ll be interesting to see how the season shakes out, but one thing is for sure: we can’t count on Price, and it’s a huge problem.
Photo: Google
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