Sonny Gray Wins 18th as Red Sox Clean Guardians 1-0, Clinch AL No. 5 Seed and Yankees Matchup

Sonny Gray pitched six scoreless innings for his 18th win, and the Boston Red Sox beat the Cleveland Guardians 1-0 on Wednesday evening to clinch the American League’s No. 5 seed.

Boston locked up the second wild-card spot and can face the New York Yankees in a best-of-three first-round sequence, The Associated Press reported.

Gray allowed 4 singles, struck out three and walked one, reducing his ERA to 2.72. The win tied him with Philadelphia’s Cristopher Sánchez for the most important league lead, and he’s in line to grow to be the fourth Red Sox pitcher since 2000 to steer the AL in victories, becoming a member of Rick Porcello (2016), Josh Beckett (2007) and Curt Schilling (2004), in line with the AP. Gray improved to 18-5.

The recreation’s solely run got here within the sixth. Jarren Duran led off with a single, moved up on a groundout and scored on Andruw Monasterio’s two-out single. Boston completed with 12 hits, all singles, however went 1 for 9 with runners in scoring place, KNBR reported.

Aroldis Chapman struck out the facet within the ninth for his thirty fifth save.

Foster Griffin took the loss for Cleveland, permitting one run on 10 hits with seven strikeouts. The defeat snapped the Guardians’ six-game successful streak, however Cleveland saved its one-game lead within the AL Central when the Chicago White Sox misplaced 5-4 to Kansas City. The Guardians haven’t but clinched a postseason berth.

Boston (85-73) snapped a three-game dropping streak.

Left-hander Ranger Suárez (8-4, 3.27 ERA) begins for Boston in Thursday’s sequence finale.