NY Yankees vs Boston Red Sox Pick

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Game Overview

New York avoided a sweep at the hands of Tampa Bay with a 4-3 victory on Wednesday as a 142 road underdog. The total stayed ‘under’ the eight run line. Despite losing the first two games of this series the Yankees still have a five-game lead over Baltimore in the AL East with an overall record of 49-32. They are now 24-16 on the road and the total has stayed ‘under’ in six of their last eight games.

The Yankees’ lineup has been in a bit of a scoring slump over the past week or so; averaging less than four runs in its last five games. New York may have to rely on its pitching in this game with Hiroki Kuroda getting the start. The right-hander is 8-7 in 16 previous outings with a 3.17 ERA. He is coming off one of his best efforts of the year after holding Chicago scoreless through seven innings to get the win.

Boston continues to try and battle its way back into the AL East race with an overall record of 42-40, but it is now 7.5 games behind the Yankees after dropping three straight-games to Oakland in which it only managed to score a total of five runs. The Red Sox fell to 21-19 on the road this season and return home for this series where they are 21-21. The total has stayed ‘under’ in eight of their last nine games.

Putting runs on the board had actually been the one strong point of Boston’s otherwise disappointing season, but its recent scoring drought actually extends back seven games with a total of 14 runs during that stretch. If the drought continues into Friday night the Red Sox will have to rely on Josh Beckett to try and gain the early edge in this series. He is 4-7 on the year with an ERA of 4.06. The right-hander missed a few starts with a sore shoulder but went six innings last Saturday against Seattle and gave-up two earned runs on four hits. Beckett is 14-7 against the Yankees with a 5.36 ERA.

Prediction

The Red Sox lost their only two previous games against New York this season, but stick with them to get a win on Friday night behind a strong effort by Beckett as both team’s bats remain relatively quiet. Boston 4 New York 3