None of that kept Boston from getting rolling early and never letting go. Whatever the board expected walking in, the actual game wasn't the coin flip it looked like on paper.
Boston carried a 3-2 mark across its last 5 games into Saturday, having taken 2 of 3 from the Marlins before dropping the series opener to New York a day earlier. New York sat at the same 3-2 clip over its own last 5 and had won its last game, that 1-0 nail-biter over Boston.
Both injury boards are long, and neither team is treating it as a surprise anymore. New York also had Clarke Schmidt and Ryan McMahon starting rehab assignments in the minors the same day, a sign the roster could look different soon even as Saturday's lineup played thin.
Boston pushed a run across early, added another later, then blew it open late, finishing with 9 hits against just 2 errors. New York's bats never got loose in response, managing only 4 hits and no runs across 9 innings under clear skies and 78-degree weather at the Stadium — a shutout that locked in a lopsided final.
The opener is in the books. Fried's return in the nightcap is next, and how Boston's beat-up lineup answers a fresh left-hander says more about this stretch than one blowout afternoon ever could.