It’s a rare thing for a Red Sox fan to cheer for a member of the New York Yankees.
Aaron Judge caused some of Boston’s faithful to make an exception on his latest visit to Fenway Park. Judge hit his major league-leading 56th and 57th home runs, Gleyber Torres had a go-ahead three-run double in the 10th inning and the Yankees held on to beat the Red Sox 7-6 on Tuesday night.
Playing in New York’s 142nd game, the Yankees slugger’s second drive of the night brought fans from both sides of the rivalry to their feet in applause as he moved four from tying the American League home run record Roger Maris set with the Yankees in 1961.
“(Red Sox fans) were wearing me out on deck, I don’t know if they were cheering or not,” Judge said. “They were wearing me out. But nah, it’s all of baseball fans. Just fans all over. Red Sox, Yankees — it doesn’t matter. They came here to see a good game and to see a show. Both teams I think put on a good show for them.”
After going homerless in five games, Judge had a pair of tying solo homers, off Nick Pivetta in the sixth and Garrett Whitlock in the eighth.
“I’m out of adjectives,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Just really impressive what he did.”
Judge has 10 multi-homer games this season, one shy of the AL record Hank Greenberg set in 1938, and 26 in his career. Judge’s three hits raised his average to .310, and he leads the major leagues in home runs and with 123 RBIs. Judge has a 1.105 OPS this season and 32 RBIs in his last 38 games.
Philadelphia’s Kyle Schwarber is second in the major leagues with 37 homers, making this the first time a player finished a day with a 20-homer lead since the final day of the 1928 season, when Babe Ruth was 23 ahead of Jim Bottomley and Hack Wilson, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
New York, which came from behind three times, reopened a six-game AL East lead, its largest since Sept. 1.
Torres broke a 4-4 tie in the 10th against former Mets reliever Jeurys Familia (2-3). He has eight RBIs in his last three games after getting just three in his previous 14.
“I was telling myself: ‘Just be simple. Hit the ball the other way because I know second base is in the shift,'” Torres said. “Don’t try to do too much, just put the ball in play.”
Clay Holmes (6-3) hit Reese McGuire with a pitch and got one out in the 10th, and Alex Verdugo had an RBI single that put runners at the corners.
Xander Bogaerts popped out to shallow left, and Peralta bounced a fastball for a run-scoring wild pitch. Wandy Peralta struck out Devers on the seventh pitch of the at-bat, his first slider of the night, for his fourth save.
“It’s been like that the whole season, you know? The guys are putting in effort, putting good at-bats, but we haven’t been able to put them away,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said.
Rookie Triston Casas, McGuire, and Bogaerts homered for Boston, which has lost eight of 14 to the Yankees this season. Casas hit his first home run at Fenway Park, and McGuire hit his first home run this season. Pivetta allowed three runs and six hits in 5 1/3 innings, walked two, and struck out five.
Marwin Gonzalez hit the first of three tying homers for New York, a two-run drive in the third. New York’s Gerrit Cole struck out 10 over six innings but was tagged for all three of Boston’s home runs over six innings.
Cole called what everyone is getting to witness with Judge “special”: “I feel very fortunate to be able to play on the same team with him,” Cole said. “It’s one of the most historic offensive seasons of all-time. … I’m humbled to be a part of it.”
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