How Red Sox reacted to winning AL East at Yankee Stadium: 'It's special ... it was fun'

Posted September 21, 2018 at 06:15 AM | Updated September 21, 2018 at 07:24 AM

Red Sox Yankees Baseball

Frank Franklin II | AP

Randy Miller | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

NJ Advance Media

The Yankees will be in the playoffs, too – they’re closing to clinching one of two AL Wild Cards – but they badly wanted to be division champs for the first time since 2012.

The Yanks have had a very good regular season – they’re 93-59 record is the third best in the majors – but they couldn’t keep up with the Red Sox, who won 17 of their first 19 en route to winning 104 games with nine to go.

Here’s what a few Red Sox players had to say about their journey, clinching at Yankee Stadium and the Yankees:

Andrew Benintendi

Frank Franklin II | AP

Andrew Benintendi, LF

On clinching the AL East: “We have not played our best baseball the last couple of weeks, but we still came out and played hard every day, and when you do that you put yourself in a good position to win and things like this happen.”

On not getting to the World Series the last two seasons after being division champs: “The last two years have been a bitter taste and we want more. Our goal is to win the World Series and this is the first step.”

On the best moment of the season: "I think the Yankees’ season where we swept them four games (at Fenway Park) kind of put us in the mindset that we can run away with this. It’s been a fun ride since then.”

On clinching at Yankee Stadium: “Regardless of where we were, it’s going to be a fun time. It happened to be here. And to be honest, the Yankees are a really good team and they’ve had a great season. It’s probably the toughest division in baseball, so to win this is pretty special.”

On the Red Sox fans taking over Yankee Stadium after the game: “They stuck around all night. Once (Giancarlo) Stanton hit that grand slam (to put the Yankees ahead 6-4 in the fourth inning), it would have been easy to fold and pack it in. But we put together good at-bats all night and put a lot of pressure on their pitchers, so it was a good win.”

On the Yankees not being able to keep up with the Red Sox in the AL East: “Everybody knew we had a good team and what we were capable of, so we’re sure happy to have it over before that last (Yankees-Red Sox) series next weekend.”

Boston Red Sox v New York Yankees

Jim McIsaac | Getty Images

Craig Kimbrel, closer

On clinching at Yankee Stadium: “Going into the year, we knew it was going to be us two at the top. I just think we played well against the guys that we’re supposed to be heads-up against. Clinching in New York, it’s fun. Were glad we got it over with and got it done and did it here, but we understand we’ve got a lot of baseball left to play.”

On the Red Sox fans taking over Yankee Stadium after the game: “It was great. It’s a long season. Obviously this is just one game, but we’ve won a lot of games this year and we put ourselves in this situation, and right now we get to celebrate for all the hard work we put in. But we’ve got a lot left to do.”

On maybe playing the Yankees in a Division Series: “There’s a possibility. It looks like it’s going to be New York and Oakland for the Wild Card, so we’ll see what happens."

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