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BOSTON — In this maddeningly inconsistent year, why wouldn’t the Yankees go into Fenway Park to face the hottest team in the American League and come away with one of their most resounding victories of the season?
The Yankees kicked off the nine-game stretch that will close out — and likely define — their season with an 8-3 win over the Red Sox, scoring seven runs in the first three innings in support of Gerrit Cole, who didn’t give up a hit until the fourth before he faltered in the sixth.
It was the Yankees’ fourth straight win and they improved to 9-4 since a seven-game losing streak threatened to derail their season. And it came against the Red Sox, who had won seven in a row before Friday.
The victory brought the Yankees back to within a game of Boston for the top wild-card spot in the AL with eight games to play.
“They’re all important,’’ manager Aaron Boone said before the game. “Win or lose this ball game tonight, we’ve got an even more important one tomorrow. We’re down to the wire, neck-and-neck, playing teams that are fighting for the same thing. We want to play well and hopefully things take care of themselves.”
The Yankees took care of business early and fended off an attempted comeback when Wandy Peralta struck out Bobby Dalbec to end the seventh inning.
The Yankees got to Boston right-hander Nathan Eovaldi early and often.
After DJ LeMahieu and Anthony Rizzo opened the game with singles, Aaron Judge drove a double to center that scored LeMahieu for the first run of the game. Rizzo scored on a groundout by Giancarlo Stanton and Gleyber Torres added a two-out single to drive in Judge to make it 3-0.
They scored four more when they batted around in the fourth.
Rizzo started the inning with a double, Judge walked and Stanton drilled a three-run homer.
The inning somehow got worse for Boston from there. Joey Gallo singled and, after Eovaldi rebounded to retire Torres and Gio Urshela, the right-hander walked Brett Gardner to finally end his night after just 2 ²/₃ innings.
Hirokazu Sawamura took over for Eovaldi and got Kyle Higashioka to hit a pop-up, but converted first baseman Kyle Schwarber overran the ball and it dropped behind him for an RBI single.
The 7-0 lead gave Cole plenty of room to work with. The Yankees’ ace was coming off a rough start at home against Cleveland, when he matched a season-worst Sunday by giving up seven earned runs.
He was back in good form on Friday.
Cole pitched around a leadoff walk to Kiké Hernandez in the first, aided by an inning-ending double-play grounder from Xander Bogaerts. He also walked J.D. Martinez in the second and Hernandez again in the third, but that was it until a two-out ground rule double by Martinez in the fourth.
Hernandez and Schwarber opened the bottom of the sixth with base hits to give Boston runners on the corners with no one out, giving some life to the packed house of 36,026.
Cole came back and got Bogaerts looking for the first out, but Rafael Devers homered to cut the Yankees’ lead to 7-3.
Martinez followed with a shot to the track in right that Judge tracked down.
A Torres blast to center to lead off the seventh just got over the wall for his eighth homer to add to the Yankees’ lead.
The Yankees threatened later in the inning, with singles by Gio Urshela and Brett Gardner, but Higashioka flied out to center and LeMahieu’s deep fly ball was run down by Hernandez in front of the wall in center. And Rizzo hit a smash that was played well by Bogaerts at short.
Clay Holmes, a revelation since arriving in a trade from Pittsburgh in July, retired the first two batters in the seventh, but consecutive singles knocked him out of the game, leaving Peralta to face Dalbec — pinch-hitting for Schwarber. Peralta got the slugger swinging to end the threat.
Chad Green closed it in the ninth, as the Yankees improved to 2-6 at Fenway Park this season.
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