Just when you thought things couldn't get any more awkward following the No Mas moment between Gerrit Cole and Rafael Devers in the fourth inning Saturday at the stadium, Boston manager Alex Cora admitted before Sunday's game that the Red Sox tried to hit Aaron Judge with a pitch in the sixth inning.
“That’s not allowed,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said when he was told of Cora’s declaration, which came after his team’s 5-2 win in which Judge hit a 445-foot shot to dead-red center in the third inning for No. 53. “That’s somebody else to settle.”
This 27-hour slice of life will become a peculiar footnote in the rivalry's history. It's not Harry Frazee selling the Babe. It's not Thurman Munson and Carlton Fisk, it's not Graig Nettles and Bill Lee, it's not Bucky Dent going deep to left, it's not Grady Little leaving Pedro Martinez in the game too long, it's not a third baseman named Boone going late into the night in Game 7 of 2003, and it's not blowing/blowing a 3-0 lead in the ALCS a year later.
But it was kind of a thing.
Cora stated his admission matter-of-factly when asked if the same thing applied from Saturday, when he accused Cole of intentionally hitting Devers in the first inning. In fact, Cole did strike out three batters in his 4 ¹/₃ innings of work.
“It was shut down around the sixth inning yesterday,” the manager said, making a statement that might be mistaken for one uttered enthusiastically by the “Law and Order” folks, except that it was said casually. “We had our chance. It didn't happen. We've got to move on.”
In the sixth inning, Boston starter Brian Belo's first pitch sailed past Judge's legs before the No. 99 lined out to deep center. Belo was replaced by Bailey Horn.
“That’s baseball,” said a calm judge, sounding like a John Sterling imitator. “He missed. There was nothing I could do.”
Cora also inadvertently said he met with Judge after the game, while he thought he was being asked about his post-game conversation with Boone. When Judge was asked about this, he dismissed it as “a good conversation, let's leave it at that.”
What Judge did was to take his bat about two-thirds of the way up the line after giving the Yanks a 4-0 lead, with the drive hitting the front of the restaurant above Monument Park. If that were a statement, Judge wouldn't say it. That's not a blank slate.
“I thought I always did that,” he said. “No?”
The Yankees won three of four games and finished the homestand with a three-game division lead over the Orioles after going 5-2 in The Bronx. Gleyber Torres consistently homered from the leadoff spot. Carlos Rodon was excellent. The remade bullpen did the job. It was a good day for Boone's team.
Maybe Saturday and Cole's absurd decision to intentionally walk Devers in the fourth inning will prove to be nothing more than a minor lapse and a stain that remains mysterious. Maybe it was just a 24 or 48-hour story that will be forgotten by the time the playoffs begin and Cole gets the ball for Game 1.
But I don't know. And it's not the fine details that confuse me. It's not whether catcher Austin Wells was involved in the discussion between Cole and pitching coach Matt Blake in the previous inning or whether he was part of the pre-planning meetings in which the concept was explicitly introduced.
This isn’t a case of a communication breakdown, for which Boone took responsibility when asked on Sunday, though confusion in the dugout is never a good sign.
I don't understand the mindset to introduce Cole to such a concept during a game or in the dugout an inning before Devers is up to bat. It seems like the exact opposite of positive thinking.
It's impossible to believe Roger Clemens would have acted that way. Heck, Clemens would have thrown the bat at Devers before giving him a free pass. It's impossible to believe CC Sabathia would agree to this. Not to mention Catfish Hunter, Tom Seaver, Don Drysdale or Bob Gibson. Can you imagine?
But maybe that's not fair to Cole, who fits the definition of a throwback starter like Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer. Cole always takes the ball. He's as traditional an ace as anyone can be. Yet, he was waving a figurative white flag from the mound while dramatically waving Devers to take his base as if the pitcher were a domineering usher working the Lincoln Center Philharmonic.
Plus, this is the age of analytics that Cole exists in. He’s also with a Yankees organization that considers itself the smartest operation despite a championship drought since 2009.
This is that crew, remember, and it includes Blake, who gave you Deivi Garcia in the Game 2 opener in a best-of-five game against Tampa Bay in 2020, which the Yanks lost in five after taking a 1-0 series lead.
Cole said no. Cora said the Red Sox tried to hit Judge. No. 99 went deep. The Yanks took three of four.
Footnotes to Rivalry.