After a narrow victory in Game 1, the Boston Red Sox have a chance on Wednesday to close out their best-of-three wild-card series against the New York Yankees.
The pregame narrative: Garrett Crochet dominated for the Red Sox last night, freeing up his team to use its bullpen in any way imaginable behind Brayan Bello. For the Yankees, Carlos Rodon takes the ball in hopes of extending the series to a third game on Thursday.
Check out my +400 Red Sox vs. Yankees predictions for Game 2, featuring prop bets on Cody Bellinger and Jarren Duran.
Red Sox vs. Yankees predictions
Parlay: Bellinger to get a hit | Bello over 3.5 Ks | Duran under 1.5 bases | Red Sox +2.5 (+400)
Bellinger to get a hit (-177): In a parlay consisting of four juiced-up legs, this pick has the longest odds. Still, it’s a pretty reasonable ask.
- Bellinger is 4-for-10 vs. Bello with two home runs and a walk.
- Last night, Bellinger recorded a single in New York’s loss. He now has 1+ hits in 25 of his past 33 games.
In his first year as a Yankee, the former NLCS MVP thrived in his new home park. Bellinger posted a .302/.365/.544 slash line in 80 regular season games at Yankee Stadium.
Bello has a .264 xBA this year, per Baseball Savant, which ranks in the 25th percentile among pitchers.
MLB SGP legs
Bello over 3.5 Ks (-180): The main risk here is Bello’s workload, which could be curtailed with so many fresh arms in the bullpen.
But this is a low bar, and the matchup is enticing.
- Bello has 4+ strikeouts in all three starts vs. the Yankees this season.
- He has 41 Ks in 152 plate appearances against New York’s current lineup. That equates to a 27.0% K rate, which is well above league average (22.2%).
Bello’s outs prop is set at 14.5, which means there’s a fair chance he doesn’t get past the fifth inning. But he shouldn’t need to do that to get to four strikeouts anyway.
In Game 1, the Yankees struck out 13 times.
Duran under 1.5 total bases (-315): Duran struggles in lefty-on-lefty matchups, and we’ve already seen that play out against Rodon.
- New York’s southpaw pitcher has held Duran to 2-for-16 batting with a double, a walk and five strikeouts.
- Duran is hitless in seven at-bats vs. Rodon this year.
- Against LHPs as a whole in 2025, Duran is batting .211 with a .600 OPS.
In Game 1, Duran batted seventh against left-hander Max Fried and went 0-for-4. It wouldn’t be at all surprising to see him slotted somewhere low in the lineup again tonight.
Duran has gone under 1.5 bases in six of his past eight games.
Red Sox vs. Yankees run line prediction
Red Sox +2.5 (-286): As with Game 1, the Yankees are favoured to win tonight. But the Red Sox have been good enough in this matchup that I’m content to at least back them with some cushion.
- Boston is 10-4 with a +17 run differential against New York this season.
- Dating back to July 2024, the Red Sox are 4-1 in Bello’s starts vs. the Yankees. And the right-hander has a 2.45 ERA in those outings.
Rodon has been a better pitcher than Bello this season, but his numbers against the Red Sox are just so-so.
Boston scored 11 runs over 15.2 innings vs. Rodon this season, and he took the loss in two of his three starts.
Red Sox vs. Yankees predictions as of 9:26 a.m. on 10/01/2025.
Jordan enjoys writing data-driven game previews and analysis articles — especially for MLB markets or NFL/NBA props. And as a proud Ohio University grad, he’ll always have a soft spot for college sports (especially if the Bobcats are involved). Previous stops include mlb.com, Sportsnet and The Athletic.