Cam Schlittler is going to win the American League Cy Young winner in November and will probably collect some MVP votes while he’s at it.
But if the Yankees ace keeps pitching like that against the Red Sox in the playoffs, they’re going to start naming babies, streets and everything else in these parts after him.
And Ben Rice may not be far behind.
Schlittler and Rice, the sons of Massachusetts, continued to torment their hometown team and carry the Yankees, combining to escape with a 9-0 victory over the Red Sox in Game 1 of the AL wild-card series Tuesday night in a raucous Yankee Stadium.
Schlittler struck out 10 in 6 ¹/₃ shutout innings, all in a close game before Rice helped break it open — his eighth-inning grand slam provided the coup de grace on his second homer and fourth hit of the night.
“The work is not done,” Schlittler said. “We need to get another win (Wednesday). But it’s well known that if you want to be a legend, which is obviously the goal, you have to do it in the playoffs.
“So go out there and get some dominant starts and put the team in a position to win. And that’s kind of the most important thing. I think a lot of guys today did a great job of that.”
Flamethrower Schlittler, 25, who mixed in more curveballs than he has at any start in his career, allowed just two singles and a walk. After throwing his career-high 117th and final pitch of the night in the seventh inning of a game that was then 2-0, he left to chants of “MVP” and a thunderous ovation from the sold-out crowd of 48,737.
After dominating the Red Sox in the deciding Game 3 of the AL wild-card series here last year — pitching eight shutout innings with 12 strikeouts to announce his arrival on the big stage — Schlittler delivered again Tuesday to give the Yankees a chance to complete the sweep Wednesday when they hand the ball to Max Fried against Sonny Gray.
Rice, who like Schlittler (and Anthony Volpe, who also had a good night) was signed and scouted by Matt Hyde, led the Aaron Judge-less offense with four of his 12 hits — matching the same number of hits he had in six playoff games last year — while driving in six runs.
“I’ll remember getting a ‘W’ against the Red Sox – there’s nothing better than that,” Rice said. “I’ll remember Cam coming out and turning the lights out, like he always does. I’ll remember the atmosphere. It was just a great night.”
What threatened to be the Yankees’ kryptonite in the series — the Red Sox’ parade of left-handed weapons — turned out to be their offensive key for Game 1. Their left-handed hitters (Rice, Cody Bellinger, Spencer Jones and Austin Wells) went 7 for 13 against three Red Sox lefties, including starter Payton Tolle, who lasted only 4 ²/₃ innings.
What made matters worse for the Red Sox was the fact that they lost one of their best hitters, Roman Anthony, to a recurrence of his hand injury midway through Game 1 that threatened his availability for the remainder of the Series.
Schlittler fired, striking out three in the top of the first inning – two on his curveball, foreshadowing how important that would be for him on the way to a career-high 24 whiffs – on a night when he lowered his career ERA to 0.47 in six starts against the Red Sox.
The bottom of the Yankees’ lineup started the scoring in the second inning, which George Lombard Jr. led off with a single – becoming the youngest player (21 years, 119 days) in franchise history to record a hit in his postseason debut – before Volpe roped in a single of his own with one out.
Then, with two outs, Wells lined a left-to-left single to the right side to take a 1-0 lead.
Rice, who crushed 41 homers during the regular season but cooled some during the summer months when Judge was out with a broken rib, greeted left-handed reliever Erik Miller in the fifth inning with a solo blast in Monument Park to double the lead.
Paul Blackburn relieved Schlittler in the seventh inning and rolled a ball into a double play to erase the inherited runner. But from there, the Yankees added on against the Red Sox bullpen, scoring twice against left-handed reliever Alec Gamboa before Rice broke him open in the eighth, a fitting exclamation point on a night that belonged to him and Schlittler.
“Pretty remarkable,” manager Aaron Boone said. “For them to come out and have this kind of night together to start these playoffs, it’s pretty incredible and a little hard to understand, frankly. But I’m certainly glad we have these two.”
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