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The New York Yankees take on the Boston Red Sox. Check out our MLB odds series for our Yankees Red Sox prediction and pick.
Jameson Taillon gets the ball for the Yankees, while Nick Pivetta takes the mound for the Red Sox.
Jameson Taillon has a 3.63 ERA. He has had a solid season for the Yankees, but he has noticeably regressed over the past month. On June 2, he carried a no-hitter into the eighth inning against the Angels and finished with an eight-inning, one-run performance. His ERA after that masterpiece was 2.30, so you can see that his ERA has increased by over 1.3 runs since then. Taillon has had difficult outings against the Twins (June 7), Astros (June 23), and most recently, against his former team, the Pirates (July 5). In those three starts, Taillon has given up 15 earned runs in 15 innings, which is easy math: a 9.00 ERA. The Yankees aren't panicking, but they certainly hope Taillon can regroup and reestablish himself as the pitcher he was through June 2. That will stabilize the rotation and make sure the bullpen doesn't get overworked in the second half of the season.
Nick Pivetta has a 3.68 ERA, but you need to look below the surface when measuring his 2022 season. Pivetta served up an 8.27 ERA in April, when the Red Sox could not tie their shoelaces and tumbled far below the .500 mark. When Boston regrouped in May and June and surged up the standings, Pivetta was brilliant. He posted a 2.11 ERA in May and a 2.25 ERA in June to give an injury-plagued Red Sox rotation the consistency it needed. He has been a very importance piece of the Boston roster this year. The Red Sox would be in a far worse place without him. He did get roughed up by the Rays — seven runs in 5 2/3 innings — in his most recent outing, but that seems to be an aberration, not an indicator. We'll find out here if that start might have been a more alarming sign than most people think. Boston should ultimately not be concerned.
Courtesy of FanDuel, here are the Yankees-Red Sox MLB odds.
MLB Odds: Yankees-Red Sox Odds
New York Yankees: -1.5 (+114)
Boston Red Sox: +1.5 (-137)
Over: 9 (-112)
Under: 9 (-108)
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Why The Yankees Could Cover the Spread
The Yankees let one get away on Saturday, leading 5-3 heading into the bottom of the 10th and watching the Red Sox score three runs for a 6-5 comeback win. When a team scores one run in extra innings, that's basically like making par on a golf hole. Scoring two runs is a birdie, since that's one run more than the Manfred Man who begins the 10th inning on second base. Teams should expect to win when they score two, and the Yankees' normally reliable bullpen faltered. The Yankees are going to come out firing against Nick Pivetta. This is a great team which suffered an unusually difficult loss. Everything about the 2022 Yankees would tell you this team will respond the right way.
Why The Red Sox Could Cover the Spread
After winning Saturday night and snapping a four-game losing streak, the Red Sox got the injection of confidence they needed. They won on a night when they had to send unproven Kutter Crawford to the mound against the red-hot Yankees, and Crawford delivered a performance which could change the trajectory of this team's season. The Red Sox know how banged up their starting rotation is. They know they defied the odds on Saturday. Now they get to ride with one of their few healthy starters against Jameson Taillon, who has clearly struggled in recent weeks. The pitching matchup finally favors Boston in this series. That's a huge plus for the Sox.
Final Yankees-Red Sox Prediction & Pick
The Yankees could obviously score eight runs, and no one would be shocked. Yet, the Red Sox won the kind of game playoff teams win on Saturday. That's going to give Boston a lot of emotional fuel, and the pitching matchup works in their favor. Sox outright is a good play, and Sox plus a run and a half is an even better one.
Final Yankees-Red Sox Prediction & Pick: Red Sox +1.5
