BOSTON — Cam Schlittler stood on the Fenway Park mound in the fifth inning Thursday with the game still in his grip, then watched it slip away on a ball he never touched.
Amed Rosario could not handle a 112-mph rocket off the bat of Willson Contreras. The error opened a four-run inning, Caleb Durbin slammed the door with a two-run homer, and the Yankees fell to the Red Sox 6-3 in the opener of a four-game set. New York committed four errors and allowed six unearned runs.
Schlittler took the loss. Yet the night still pushed him into the Yankees record book. Because every run charged to him was unearned, his season ERA dropped to a major-league-best 1.62, even in defeat.
That mark now carries historical weight. The rookie right-hander owns one of the best starts to a season any Yankees pitcher has ever produced, and a sloppy team loss did nothing to slow it.
Velocity, then trouble, then the turn
The start had the shape of a grind from the first pitch. A one-out walk to Ceddanne Rafaela and a catcher’s interference call on Austin Wells put two on in the opening inning. Schlittler answered, striking out Contreras on a 97-mph fastball and getting Jarren Duran to ground out.
The second inning brought its own mess. Schlittler and Wells let a Durbin popup drop between them, and a hit batter again put two runners aboard. He escaped, blowing a 99-mph fastball past Marcelo Mayer.
His velocity climbed from there. The fastball touched 100 mph more than once in a 1-2-3 third. He pitched out of a second-and-third jam in the fourth, ending it by overpowering Mayer with a 100-mph pitch.
Then the fifth unraveled. Contreras scorched the grounder past Rosario, the run scored, and Durbin followed with the go-ahead drive that finally ended Schlittler’s night.
A record-tying start to a season
But the Yankees ace still set a milestone.
Schlittler’s 1.62 ERA is the second-lowest by a Yankees pitcher through his first 17 starts of a season since earned runs became official in 1913, according to MLB statistician Sarah Langs. Only Ray Caldwell’s 1.60 mark in 1914 sits ahead of him.
The 25-year-old, a 6-foot-6, 215-pound power arm, has turned into a runaway favorite for the American League Cy Young Award. He has given the Yankees a front-line anchor in a season when the rotation needed one. Thursday was not his sharpest outing, and it still trimmed his ERA from 1.71.
His final line read five innings, five hits, two walks and nine strikeouts on the night. None of the four runs against him were earned, the result of the Rosario error that wiped out a potential double play in the fifth.
Schlittler left with the Yankees trailing 4-2. He had stranded six runners over the first four innings before a full-count cutter to Durbin caught too much of the zone.
A history with this stage
Thursday was Schlittler’s second career start at Fenway Park, in front of family and friends. His first, on April 23, was a different story. He went a season-high eight innings, allowing two runs and one earned, four hits and one walk in a 4-2 Yankees win.
His biggest moment against Boston came last October. In a deciding Game 3 of the Wild Card round at Yankee Stadium, he threw eight shutout innings for the Yankees, allowing five hits and no walks with 12 strikeouts in a 4-0 victory.
He carried the edge into June. After a fan taunted him before his June 19 start against the Reds, Schlittler struck out a career-high 13 in a 5-0 win, then answered the post online. Boone, who has his own rivalry history, has enjoyed the energy his pitcher brings.
“I enjoy Cam,” Boone said. “It’s given me some things to make fun of him about in lighter moments. Obviously, this is a tremendous, storied rivalry, and Cam’s become an important part of that, certainly in the present.”
Where things stand
The second-year starter remains the American League’s measuring stick and the clearest Cy Young frontrunner.
Through 17 starts, Schlittler sits at 8-4 with a 1.62 ERA, 118 strikeouts and only 20 walks. That is not a hot stretch anymore. That is a full ace-level résumé. The Yankees ace has worked exactly 100.0 innings, allowed just 72 hits and given up only 18 earned runs, leaving him with a sharp 0.92 WHIP.
The Boston loss added noise, not evidence against him. When a pitcher keeps missing bats, limits traffic and avoids earned damage, one ugly defensive night cannot knock him off the AL throne.
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