Not Just Another Game

By Guest
Updated: May 3, 2018

Rivalries fuel sports. They pump up the players and fans alike while attracting nationwide media attention. They are the games you circle on your calendar and wait for all year. You need a few things to fall into place to develop a good ole rivalry, however. First and foremost, the teams must be good. Nobody cares about two cellar dwellers fighting for last place. The games must mean something. Preferably, the major networks’ bookie software should have the teams as evenly matched, to drum up TV demand. Bonus points if you meet regularly in the playoffs. There needs to be a bit of bad blood and some healthy respect – dare we say hate – between the teams. If the respective cities you hail from happen to hate each other too, it makes the stakes even larger and magnifies each play. Let’s put the Red Sox and Yankees under the microscope and see if they meet this criteria. Are the teams good? Are the games meaningful? Yes and yes. The Sox and Yanks were separated by only two games atop the AL East in 2017 and are at the front of the pack again in the early going this year. Any bad blood to speak of? Yes, we can thank Tyler Austin for that. How does each city feel about the other? Have you ever talked to a New Yorker? There is your answer. Yankees-Red Sox has heated back up and has returned as baseball’s fiercest rivalry.

What’s Happened Lately?

The Yankees got the best of the Sox in 2017, prevailing eleven times in nineteen games. Five of those wins came in front of the Boston crowd at Fenway, a number that the Sox faithful would like to see decline this year as the Yankees had nearly the same winning percentage in Boston as the hometown Sox. The teams have met for one three-game series thus far in the 2018 campaign, with the Red Sox taking two out of three from the Bronx Bombers. The Yankees took their shots, however, starting a bench clearing brawl and snapping the Sox 10-game winning streak in the process. The Yankees are trying to show that last year’s ALCS run was no fluke. They are for real.

The Perfect Ingredients

The Red Sox currently hold the second best odds to win a World Series in 2018 with the Yankees holding the third. I’m cheering for the same thing you know the media desperately wants, a Yankees-Red Sox playoff series. Gone are the days of Jeter vs. Big Papi. Each team is quite young and budding with fresh, young talent. Should these players decide to stick around for a few years, we will have the next generation of opposing superstars. Sluggers Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton will need to overcome the likes of Chris Sale and David Price should they want that coveted AL East title that eluded them in 2017. Rafael Devers and Xander Bogaerts will have to prove they can hit in the clutch against the likes of Dellin Betances and Aroldis Chapman. These teams have all of the ingredients for a classic playoff series. Can they live up to expectations?