Yankees Highlights: Red Sox absolutely demolish Masahiro Tanaka

Well, it’s certainly good you can’t blow an 11-game division lead all in one game. The Red Sox came out apparently hell-bent on making up an enormous deficit all in one go. In the end, Boston only moved one game closer to New York, but that one game was a nightmare: a 19-3 demolition at Fenway Park. You have to go all the way back to... last October, when the Red Sox embarrassed the Yankees 16-1 in game three of the ALDS, to find a time when Boston trounced the Bombers so thoroughly.

Winner of the Game

There are no winners on a night like tonight. Ok, fine, we will acknowledge Kyle Higashioka, who rocked a solo homer in his first major-league start since April. I wish I could use this space to laud Austin Romine for navigating the Boston lineup when pressed into position-player-pitching duty, but alas, he allowed four runs in one frame. At least Romine kept up his streak of appearing as a pitcher in 15-plus-run losses to the Red Sox.

Loser of the Game

Masahiro Tanaka turned in one of the worst starts in recent Yankees history tonight, so he’ll have to wear it. Tanaka yielded 12 (12!) runs in 3.1 innings. He was tagged for seven runs right off the bat, and Aaron Boone asked him to work through a few more innings to try to spare a tired bullpen. Tanaka couldn’t hold the line, and was popped for a five spot in the fourth. He fell underneath an absolute barrage of hard contact, with eight balls leaving Boston’s bats at a speed greater than 97 mph.

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FanGraphs