The Yankees will play the beasts of the AL East this week.
But before the Orioles come to The Bronx on Tuesday, the Yankees will first take on the Red Sox at Fenway Park. The team that entered the season as American League favorites on paper got swept by the Rangers and lowly Indians to start 0-6.
The Red Sox gave up 26 runs in their opening series, leading one Boston newspaper to run the headline “Epic Failure.” But before they were failures, they were favorites to win the American League with the prized offseason pickups Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez the main reason.
“Gonzalez and Crawford are tremendous players, so it’s just how you handle the increased media situation,” MLB Network analyst and former Red Sox first baseman Kevin Millar said. “I played with Edgar Renteria in 2005, and he didn’t handle it very well. I saw him get beat up that way. Those are the kind of things that go on in that media market, and how you handle the failure is so important. Carl has the makeup; Adrian’s not going to skip a beat. It may take a bit of time, but this team is going to be fine.”
The signing of Crawford, who was dropped from third to seventh in the lineup after two games and then moved up to No. 2, and acquisition of Gonzalez relegated the Yankees to the unfamiliar underdog role. That’s despite the fact the Yankees are the only team in baseball with a payroll over $200 million.
“I think the Yankees are going to play well into this underdog chip on the shoulder,” said Millar, who is co-hosting “Intentional Talk,” a new show on MLBN this season.
“Everyone is going to question a $200 million underdog, but on paper everyone had the Red Sox. I was one of those guys also. When they got Gonzalez, I said, ‘Wow, this is the makings of the best team in baseball.’ ”
They certainly haven’t looked like it, though, getting outscored 38-16 in the first five games following a 1-0 loss in Cleveland on Thursday.
The underdog attitude the Yankees have embraced is one Millar said his Red Sox teams had when he played against the Bombers in Boston from 2003-05. But Millar doesn’t see either club as an underdog, as the two get set to begin a three-game series today.
“This is the first time I’ve seen Red Sox picked across the board,” Millar said.
“That’s what is intriguing to me because this Yankees team is a darn good club. Offensively, they are good and they are going to pitch. How do you not consider the Yankees bullpen elite with Mariano Rivera, Rafael Soriano and now Joba [Chamberlain] throwing the way he is?”
Today’s matinee is the first of 18 matchups between the teams And it may be early April, but it’s still Yankees-Red Sox.
“There’s nothing more exciting than a Red Sox-Yankees series,” Millar said. “It’s like the Super Bowl in April. It’s going to be a blast, doesn’t matter what time of year it is. . . . You get to see probably the two best teams in baseball compete for three days.”
justin.terranova@nypost.com
