NEW YORK (AP) — Clay Buchholz chilled the Yankees’ bats, speedy Jackie Bradley Jr. got his first major league hit and the Boston Red Sox beat New York 7-4 on a cold Wednesday night to open a season with consecutive wins for the first time since 1999.
Pitcher Hiroki Kuroda became the latest Yankees player to get hurt, leaving in the second inning with a 2-0 deficit, four batters after Shane Victorino’s line drive bruised the middle finger of his pitching hand.
While the Red Sox under new manager John Farrell are off to their best start since going 5-0 in 1999, New York has been outscored 15-6 and outhit 26-15. The Yankees have failed to hold a lead at any point in their opening two games for the first time since 1998.
Boston burst ahead 6-0 with a four-run third against Cody Eppley, and the Yankees never challenged.
Buchholz (1-0) allowed one run and six hits in seven innings, struck out four and walked two. Joel Hanrahan pitched the ninth for his first save with Boston.
Jacoby Ellsbury drove in two runs for the Red Sox, and Bradley singled up the middle in the third for a hit he’ll long remember.
New York said Kuroda (0-1) was being sent for X-rays and other tests. The Yankees already have five All-Stars on the disabled list: shortstop Derek Jeter, third baseman Alex Rodriguez, first baseman Mark Teixeira, outfielder Curtis Granderson and pitcher Phil Hughes.
Travis Hafner and Vernon Wells hit their first home runs for the Yankees, a solo drive by Hafner in the fourth and a three-run drive by Wells in the eighth against Alfredo Aceves.
Before the first pitch, the Yankee Stadium sound system played Foreigner’s “Hot Blooded.” But it was 43 degrees at gametime, and Boston shortstop Jose Iglesias and first baseman Mike Napoli wore ski masks.
The crowd of 40,216 was the smallest for a Red Sox-Yankees game in the Bronx since 27,631 were across the street at the old ballpark on May 27, 1999, according to STATS. And for the second straight game, the stadium was nearly empty in the late innings.
Kuroda, New York’s most dependable starting pitcher last year at 16-11, allowed three singles in the first and fell behind on Jarrod Saltalamacchia’s two-out hit.
Victorino’s drive hit Kuroda’s right hand leading off the second inning. Kuroda was checked by the Yankees and stayed in the game, then hit Bradley with a pitch in the lower leg.
One out later, Kuroda walked Ellsbury on four pitches and forced in a run by hitting Daniel Nava in the lower leg. Yankees manager Joe Girardi went to the mound along with pitching coach Larry Rothschild, trainer Steve Donohue and an interpreter — allowed for the first time under a rules change this year.
Kuroda left after 1 1-3 innings, the shortest start of his five big league seasons, and was replaced by Eppley.
Run-scoring singles by Victorino and Bradley made it 4-0 in the third, and Iglesias’ double chased Eppley. Ellsbury greeted Adam Warren with a two-run single.
Hafner, wearing short sleeves, homered into the Yankees bullpen in right-center. That was the first home run of the year for New York, which hit a team-record 245 last season.
Dustin Pedroia added an RBI grounder in the sixth.
NOTES: RHP Ryan Dempster makes his Red Sox debut in Thursday’s series finale, and LHP Andy Pettitte starts for the Yankees. … The cover of The New Yorker dated April 8 features an illustration of the Yankees by Mark Ulriksen with Andy Pettitte on crutches, Rodriguez in a wheelchair, Mariano Rivera and Jeter using walkers, Ichiro Suzuki with a cane and Teixeira with an arm in a sling. At 31 years, 138 days, the Yankees had the oldest average age on opening day, according to STATS. Tampa Bay was second at 30-290. … Ben Francisco, Hafner, Shawn Kelley, Lyle Overbay, Wells and Kevin Youkilis made their Yankees’ debuts Monday, the most in a game for the franchise since the transformed Baltimore Orioles began play as the New York Highlanders on April 22, 1903. … When Yankees C Chris Stewart tumbled over the rail into the Boston dugout after grabbing Victorino’s foul pop in the seventh, Pedroia rushed over to keep him from falling.
NEW YORK (AP) — David Ortiz is on a timetable to rejoin the Boston Red Sox in the middle of the third week of April.
The designated hitter plans to travel Thursday to the team’s extended spring training in Fort Myers, Fla. He has been sidelined nearly all spring with heel inflammation after missing much of the second half of last season with a right Achilles tendon injury.
“He continues to move along the prescribed plan that’s in place,” Red Sox manager John Farrell said before Wednesday’s game against the New York Yankees. “I know with each passing day he feels better about himself, with the intensity ramping up with his running.”
Ortiz could start an injury rehabilitation assignment next week. Ortiz’s minor league games likely will be with Triple-A Pawtucket.
“I think he’d feel comfortable with 25-30 at-bats,” Farrell said.
Shortstop Stephen Drew, sidelined since he was hit on the helmet by a pitch during a spring training game on March 7, played four innings and had four at-bats in extended spring training Wednesday. Drew is on the seven-day concussion DL and is to start a rehab assignment Thursday at Double-A Portland, Maine. He can play a maximum of five games while on the concussion DL.
Suit against Schilling
should go ahead
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Rhode Island’s economic development agency says there is “crushing evidence” that former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling and others concealed financial information about his now-defunct video game company and that its lawsuit against them should be allowed to move ahead.
Max Wistow, an attorney for the Economic Development Corp., on Monday filed documents in Superior Court responding to last month’s request from Schilling and a string of other defendants that the suit be dismissed.
The 269-page filing says the defendants’ main argument — that the EDC board that approved a $75 million loan guarantee for 38 Studios in 2010 was aware the company wouldn’t have sufficient funds to complete its video game project — is false and what it calls a “red herring.” The filing says the board was, in fact, not informed about a financing shortfall and, as the initial lawsuit claims, was misled into approving the deal.
Wistow declined to comment on the filing other than to say he feels “very comfortable with our responses” and looks forward to a May 22 hearing before Judge Michael Silverstein on the parties’ arguments.
The quasi-public EDC sued Schilling, several executives at 38 Studios and some of its own former employees — the very architects of the deal — in November, five months after the company went belly up. Its collapse into bankruptcy left the state responsible for some $100 million related to the agreement, once interest is factored in. The suit alleges fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, among other things.
Attorneys for Schilling and the other 38 Studios defendants — including the former chief executive and financial officers as well as the board chairman — said in their own filings last month that company officials repeatedly disclosed the company’s financial needs. They noted that the initial suit says former EDC Executive Director Keith Stokes and others at the agency, including two law firms working for it, knew 38 Studios needed the full $75 million to produce its video game in Providence, but that it was getting only about $50 million because some was to be kept in reserve.
The EDC board is required by state law to make sure a project has sufficient funding lined up. The filing says the defendants “seek to get out from under the crushing evidence of their concealment of 38 Studios’ deficient finances” by claiming that the legal requirement for adequate funding “can be satisfied by a hope and a prayer that 38 Studios would find more money somewhere.” The defendants knew or should have known — but did not tell the board — that 38 Studios would run out of money, according to the suit.
38 Studios, named for Schilling’s jersey number when he pitched in Boston, relocated to Rhode Island from Massachusetts as part of the loan guarantee deal. Former Gov. Don Carcieri, Stokes and others at the EDC contended at the time that it was a coup for the economically struggling state because it would bring hundreds of jobs. Critics said it was far too risky an investment for the state.
A message was left Monday for an attorney representing Schilling. David Martland, who represents Stokes, said he had not looked at the filing yet but would have no comment on pending litigation. Schilling and Stokes have both called the lawsuit political.
The initial suit doesn’t seek a specific dollar amount, but the agency wants Schilling and the other defendants to repay the bonds and seeks triple damages.