The New York Yankees are going for a series sweep when they host the Boston Red Sox on Sunday Night Baseball, with first pitch on ESPN set for 7 p.m. ET. The Red Sox will send Garrett Crochet (15-5, 2.57 ERA) to the bump for this series finale, while the Yankees will roll with Will Warren (8-6, 4.22 ERA). Both New York and Boston are currently positioned well in the AL Wild Card standings, with the Yankees having a 2.5-game edge entering Sunday’s contest for the top wild card spot. The Red Sox and Astros are both two games ahead of the Rangers entering Sunday’s games.

Boston is a -155 favorite on the money line (wager $155 to win $100) in the latest consensus odds per the SportsLine Inside the Lines team model while New York is a +130 underdog (wager $100 to win $130). The total comes in at 7.5. You can see the model’s latest forecast, along with player prop projections and expert picks, at SportsLine.

Angelo Magliocca, also known as “Amags,” is a regular contributor to The Early Edge and CBS Sports HQ, is a seasoned MLB handicapper up 123.5 units over the last three MLB seasons. He’s put together a same-game parlay at DraftKings Sportsbook for Sunday Night Baseball, with Alex Bregman featured as one of the legs.

Sunday Night Baseball Same-Game Parlay: +350 (0.5 units)

I didn’t think I’d be starting off this way but can’t say I’m upset about it: the Yankees are looking for a sweep of the Red Sox on Sunday Night Baseball! You read that correctly, the New York Yankees have finally put a couple of wins together and look to make it a three-game sweep of their division rival at the perfect time while battling for a playoff spot. The Bronx Bombers ended up losing three of four to the Red Sox at home a few weeks ago but have seemingly turned the tables now, going 14-5 over that stretch with back to back wins in Boston the last two days. As the Yankees continue to surge, they’ll face maybe their toughest test of this run as the Red Sox send Crochet to the mound. The Boston southpaw picked up the win back on Aug. 23 in the Bronx, as he struck out 11 Yankees over seven strong innings, allowing just one run and five hits while walking a batter. It was an impressive start that the Red Sox needed at the time but they will need their ace more than ever to help avoid being swept at home by their main rival Sunday.

Red Sox first 5 innings -0.5

The bullpen is rather rested for the Sox here, but Aroldis Chapman may be starting to break down, having now allowed a run in each of his last two appearances after going more than a month without allowing a single runner to cross the plate. That will be something to watch, although I don’t believe it should be a major issue, seeing as Chapman has been stellar for a while now. Still, as long as there isn’t a major blow up, we’ll have Crochet on the mound for all five innings of the F5 so I’m siding with the Red Sox to grab an early lead and give him some run support against Warren (8-6, 4.22 ERA). 

At the current price, the money line for the full game is actually cheaper than the F5 money line, but my philosophy a lot of times is that I’m betting on this team (Boston in this case) to win the first five innings, so why am I going to spend an extra 50 cents to cover myself in case of a push? I’m going straight for the F5 winner here with the -0.5 spread, as I believe we have a sizable edge with Crochet over Warren. The last time the Sox faced Warren, they bounced him before the fifth inning as he allowed five runs on seven hits with three walks and a hit batsman, striking out just three. Warren has also now allowed multiple runs in each of his last two starts and funny enough, his early season struggles against lefties have subsided but the underlying numbers against right-handed batters have fallen off a cliff.

Alex Bregman 1+ hits

Speaking of the splits between right- and left-handed batters, Bregman will be on the “right” side of Warren’s recent issues vs. righties, and he’s now recorded at least one hit in eight of his last 11 games, albeit while hitting just .213 in August. Regardless, Bregman has been able to throw in at least a hit in five straight and he failed to get a hit off Warren last time out, going 0-1 with a walk and RBI. This time around, I’m not sure Warren will be so lucky and I’m backing Bregman to have some part of the run scoring efforts. He’s been a stud against left-handed pitching this year, hitting .336 with an OPS near .900 but against righties he hasn’t fared so well. Going back to last year, Bregman saw opposite splits, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see him regress back towards his numbers from last year.

Aaron Judge Over 1.5 strikeouts

Lastly, Judge was a money maker for us the last time he faced Crochet, as we bet him to strikeout in each plate appearance until he hit that late home run. I’ll be doing the same tonight and have included Judge to strike out twice into the parlay. That helps us get to +350 odds, and I think it’s a fun way to be on the strikeout prop if you’re not betting them live in each at bat. Judge had struck out nine times in 12 at-bats against the Boston lefty, and even if we get just one from Crochet against Judge, the Boston bullpen has some strikeout upside to where I think we can get one more later in the game.