Red Sox Watch Garrett Crochet Dominate And Get To The Eighth Inning With Ease Against Yankees

Trevor Story knew Garrett Crochet was dominating, he just was not sure to extent of how dazzling things were going.

It is understandable since Story was locked into everything standing at shortstop, but there also was another reason – he couldn’t find portion of the scoreboard showing the pitch count of one of the more dominant postseason outings by anyone.

For the record at Yankee Stadium the scoreboard Story was looking for is located near the bleachers by the Yankee bullpen in center field.

“I was trying to look to find his pitch count but I couldn’t find it and I saw it in the later innings, he was around 100 and I was like man, that’s why we call him the beast,” Story said after Boston beat the Yankees for the eighth time in the past nine postseason games since Game 3 of the 2004 ALCS. “He’s a frontline guy and he acts like it.”

It also is the frontline guy the Red Sox did not possess for the past three seasons following their unexpected run to the 2021 ALCS when their rotation was anchored by Nathan Eovaldi and Eduardo Rodriguez. The Red Sox certainly expected it go well but the unknown was the fact Crochet never did things like he did this year by pitching an AL-best 205 1/3 innings.

The Yankees never came close to hitting anything towards the scoreboard Story was looking because of how dominating Crochet was Tuesday night, putting the Red Sox on the verge of advancing to the Division Series and a date with the Toronto Blue Jays.

“It was very special, but he’s been very special all season long,” said Lucas Giolito who threw a no-hitter on Aug. 25, 2020 about a month before Crochet officially became his teammate on the White Sox. “I don’t think any of us in this clubhouse are expecting anything less.

“That’s just who he is. We call him the beast he’s an absolute beast. He takes the ball. He’s unfazed by any situation. It’s his first postseason start at Yankee Stadium, and he goes out there and throws the ball the way he does pretty much every time, which is just an extremely elite level. So it was a pleasure to watch.”

Crochet had some crazy or dominant numbers, notably the 117 pitches he threw to the Yankees given the era.

It was the most pitches thrown in a postseason game since Stephen Strasburg threw 117 in Game 3 of the NLCS on Oct. 14, 2019 for Washington against St. Louis. In that game, Strasburg allowed one run and seven hits to go along with 12 strikeouts.

The last time someone threw at least 117 pitches and threw a pitch in the eighth inning against the Yankees was Justin Verlander’s 124-pitch five-hitter in Houston in Game 2 of the 2017 ALCS.

The last time it happened at Yankee Stadium was Cliff Lee in Game 3 of the 2010 ALCS for the Texas Rangers on Oct. 18, 2010 and Crochet’s outing was the 45th such outing against the Yankees in the postseason sixth straight win against them under that filter.

Lee’s start might be on par to what Crochet did. Crochet allowed a homer to Anthony Volpe in the second, retired 17 straight before allowing Volpe’s second hit. In an 8-0 win that preceded a 10-3 rout in a six-game ALCS win for Texas, Lee retired the first 11 and held the Yankees hitless for 4 2/3 innings.

Crochet’s start can be described in three parts.

He allowed three hits to the first seven hitters on 26 pitches, but pitch number 13 was a 98.8 mph fastball resulting in Giancarlo Stanton hitting into a double play. After Volpe parked a sinker into the right field seats, none of the next 83 pitches Crochet threw resulted in hits until Volpe got just enough of a 90.3 mph cutter.

“That’s a crazy number,” Story said. “I wasn’t aware of it though.”

The final mistake was the penultimate at-bat against Crochet, and he ended with a 100.2 mph sinker to Austin Wells. The pitch hit the inside corner and was close enough Wells thought he actually walked but it also left the Red Sox in awe, especially since it was the only time Crochet hit 100.

“That was a cool one,” Giolito said. “He dotted the corner, 100 miles an hour. Yeah, that’s just who he is. That’s what he’s got. I’ve seen him reach back for that and his last pitch, he’s been doing that a lot. I watched his presser yesterday and he said I’m going to treat it like another game and that’s exactly what he did.”

“Everybody knows how excellent of a pitcher he is, how big he is and how tough he is,” said Aroldis Chapman, no stranger to 100 mph. “When you see that, it’s just very nice to see.”

The fact that Crochet threw 15 more pitches by Max Fried was also a case of decisions working out for the Red Sox and not so much for the Yankees, who probably helped influence Alex Cora’s mindset after seeing six pitches for a quick seventh inning.

“With them leaving me in there, I wanted to honor that decision,” Crochet said. “I felt like he’s put a lot of faith in me this year, and I haven’t let him down yet. So, I was going to be damn sure this wasn’t the first time.”

Fried might have made similar remarks if the Yankees did not remove at 102 pitches and Luke Weaver faltered. Unlike Crochet, Fried was not necessarily dominating due to jams in the fourth and fifth.

After Fried’s exit, Weaver relied on his changeup often and it failed him, which led to Masataka Yoshida anticipating a fastball and getting a pinch-hit two-run single on a first-pitch fastball.

With Crochet throwing a dominating game for his 20th win with the Red Sox, Yoshida’s good guess was pretty much it, though the Yankees threatened before leaving the bases loaded against Chapman, resulting in a possible champagne party for the Red Sox for the fourth time at the current Yankee Stadium.