Red Sox's Alex Cora Has 3-Word Message After Shutting Down Aaron Judge

A weekend that began as an epic battle between the Boston Red Sox pitchers and Aaron Judge turned surprisingly one-sided.

On Friday night, the New York Yankees superstar struck out three times against Boston ace Garrett Crochet before getting some epic revenge with a game-tying solo home run off the lefty to tie the game in the ninth inning.

It was amazing baseball theater featuring the game's best hitter. But for the rest of the weekend, Boston's pitching staff stymied Judge to the tune of an 0-for-8 line with six more punchouts. It was surprising dominance against the two-time American League Most Valuable Player.

After the much-needed sweep of the arch-rival Yankees, Red Sox manager Alex Cora spoke about how his team managed to shut down Judge, who is still batting a major league-best .378 on the season.

"It's very hard," Cora said (via NESN on X). "We saw it last weekend, we've seen it throughout the season, he's so good at what he does. But we used our fastballs in the right spots and we got some swing-and-misses.

"He had that big swing on Friday. And I've been saying, throughout the years, we've been aggressive with him. You know, sometimes he gets us, sometimes we do a good job with him. It's always fun to compete against the best, and for me, he's the best in the business right now."

Saturday starter Hunter Dobbins punched Judge out twice, then lefty reliever Justin Wilson got the slugger swinging after Cora surprisingly left him in the game. On Sunday, Brayan Bello struck Judge out all three times he faced him, then Garrett Whitlock retired him on a massive double play with the tying run on base in the eighth inning.

Most importantly, the Red Sox are back above .500 at 37-36, and right back in the hunt for the postseason. Maybe they'll even mount a challenge to Judge's Yankees, who still lead them by 6 1/2 games in the division race.