For the yankees game today, Will Warren is slated to start for New York against Ranger Suarez and the Boston Red Sox; both clubs announced full lineups ahead of the matchup.
The Yankees listed Will Warren as their starter (7-1, 3.22 ERA). New York’s lineup will feature Paul Goldschmidt, Ben Rice, Cody Bellinger, Amed Rosario, Trent Grisham, Anthony Volpe, Jazz Chisholm, José Caballero and Sanchez. Warren has gone 3-0 with a 2.78 ERA in his past four starts but is 1-2 with a 9.42 ERA in three career starts against Boston.
Boston countered with Ranger Suarez (2-3, 3.38 ERA) on the mound and a lineup of Jarren Duran, Ceddanne Rafaela, Wilyer Abreu, Willson Contreras, Masataka Yoshida, Gasper, Durbin, Seigler and Marcelo Mayer. Suarez allowed four runs on eight hits in five innings in a no-decision at Cleveland on Sunday and struck out 10 batters in a 93-pitch outing; he previously took a 4-1 loss to the Yankees on April 22 in Boston.
There are some clear matchup threads to watch. Masataka Yoshida is 3-for-4 lifetime against Warren and Jarren Duran is 2-for-8. On the other side, Anthony Volpe is 2-for-3 against Suarez and Jazz Chisholm Jr. is 6-for-20 against him. Those head-to-head marks matter when each starter has otherwise shown streaky work this season.
Friday’s series opener underlined what’s at stake: the Red Sox beat the Yankees 5-3, with Willson Contreras and Andruw Monasterio homering. Contreras drove in three runs in that game and is hitting.417 while extending a 17-game on-base streak; it’s the second time this season he’s homered in consecutive games. Boston has had multiple-home-run games 10 times this year, and as Chad Tracy put it, “They’re coming more frequently and a lot of them seem to be like big variety home runs.”
The Yankees go into today’s matchup stretched thin offensively. New York is 1-3 since Aaron Judge’s injury was announced on Tuesday; in the first four games of his absence the club has scored 13 runs, is hitting.208 and was 3-for-21 with runners in scoring position. Judge is expected to miss an extended period after the injury announcement, and the team has yet to receive a return timetable.
Today’s start will settle which team takes control of the series for now, and it will give the Yankees another chance to see if Warren can steady a rotation and if the offense can snap out of a slump without Judge. The confirmed next milestone is the scheduled first pitch; the one unresolved question that matters beyond this game is how long Judge will remain sidelined and how the Yankees will cover his production while he’s out.
