Ben Rice’s two home runs power Yankees past Red Sox 9-0 at Yankee Stadium

Schlittler gave Boston almost nothing to work with

The game’s clearest constant was Boston’s inability to put together offense. Schlittler worked 6 1/3 scoreless innings, allowed only two hits and one walk, and struck out 10 while throwing 117 pitches, 77 for strikes. He handled the heaviest share of the night, and once he exited, Paul Blackburn and John Schreiber kept the shutout intact over the final 2 2/3 innings.

Boston finished with only three hits, one walk and 11 strikeouts in 30 plate appearances. Adley Rutschman, Wilyer Abreu and Trevor Story accounted for the hits, with Story producing Boston’s only extra-base knock. Willson Contreras struck out three times, while Roman Anthony and Rutschman each struck out twice. There was no sustained stretch in which the Red Sox forced the Yankees’ staff to pitch from trouble to trouble.

That left Boston asking its pitching staff for a nearly perfect night, and it never got one. Even while the score stayed modest through the middle innings, the Red Sox were chasing because their lineup could not build traffic. A three-hit shutout can look abrupt in the box score; over nine innings, it usually means the opposing starter dictated almost every at-bat, and Schlittler did exactly that.

Rice turned a tight score into a lopsided finish

For a while, Boston stayed within touching distance. Payton Tolle gave up the opening run in the second when Austin Wells singled to right and George Lombard Jr. scored, but Tolle limited the damage and got through 4 2/3 innings with only one run allowed. That kept the Yankees from breaking the game open early, even as they kept putting runners on base.

Rice made the margin feel sturdier in the fifth, driving a 423-foot home run to centre for a 2-0 lead. The seventh then pushed the game past the point where Boston’s quiet bats could realistically recover. Rice lined a single to right that scored Spencer Jones, and later in the inning Luis García Jr. grounded into a double play that still brought Wells home for a 4-0 advantage.

The eighth was the avalanche. Wells lifted a sacrifice fly to right to score Lombard Jr., and Rice followed with a grand slam to centre, a 408-foot shot that also scored Ryan McMahon, Jones and Paul Goldschmidt. Rice finished 4-for-5 with two home runs and six RBI, the central force in New York’s offence. Wells added two hits and two RBI, Lombard Jr. collected three hits and scored twice, and Jones crossed the plate twice as the Yankees spread the rally across several spots in the order.

Our take

The final score reads like a cruise, but the Yankees’ line also carries a useful warning sign: 17 team runners left on base. New York produced 12 hits and five walks, yet much of the damage waited until the last three innings. On a night when Rice delivered two emphatic answers, that inefficiency did not matter. On another one, earlier missed chances could keep a game tighter for longer than a club would like.

Still, there is real value in how the Yankees kept generating opportunities. They struck out only four times, forced Boston’s pitchers to throw 161 pitches, and sent 39 batters to the plate. Even before the grand slam, the offensive floor was solid. The lineup kept making Boston record outs with men aboard, and eventually the volume of baserunners turned into the decisive burst.

For Boston, the path to a better result starts with giving the pitching staff more support and extending the stronger work it got from Tolle. He kept the game manageable; the rest of the staff surrendered eight runs over the final 3 1/3 innings, and the lineup never responded with enough contact to change the texture of the night. When a club hits .103, posts a .133 on-base percentage and strikes out 11 times, even a respectable opening stretch on the mound can disappear in a hurry.

Scoring moments

1. 2nd Inning

   Wells singled to right, Lombard Jr. scored, Volpe to second.

2. 5th Inning

   Rice homered to center (423 feet).

3. 7th Inning

   Rice singled to right, Jones scored, Goldschmidt to second, Wells to third.

4. 7th Inning

   García Jr. grounded into double play, second to shortstop to first, Wells scored, Rice out at second, Goldschmidt to third.

5. 8th Inning

   Wells hit sacrifice fly to right, Lombard Jr. scored.

6. 8th Inning

   Rice homered to center (408 feet), McMahon, Jones, and Goldschmidt scored.