Yankees vs Red Sox Prediction, Pick, MLB Odds for Thursday, April 23

The Boston Red Sox host the New York Yankees on April 23, 2026. First pitch from Fenway Park is scheduled for 6:10 p.m. EDT. The game will be broadcast on YES.

The Yankees are favored by -156 on the moneyline and by -1.5 on the run line. The Red Sox are +129 on the moneyline and +1.5 on the run line. The total is set at 8.5 runs.

Find my MLB picks and Yankees vs Red Sox prediction below, as well as probable pitchers, weather report, and more.

Yankees vs Red Sox Prediction

• Yankees vs Red Sox Pick: Yankees F5 ML (-140, 1u | Play to  -175)

My Yankees vs Red Sox best bet is on New York to be ahead after the first five innings. Make sure to find the best odds by checking our live MLB odds page.

Thursday, Apr 23

6:10 p.m. ET

YES

Yankees Odds
Spread	Total	Moneyline
-1.5 +109	8.5 -110o / -110u	-156

Red Sox Odds
Spread	Total	Moneyline
+1.5 -131	8.5 -110o / -110u	+129

Odds via DraftKings. Get up-to-the-minute MLB odds here.

• Yankees vs Red Sox moneyline: Yankees -156, Red Sox +129
• Yankees vs Red Sox over/under: 8.5 (-110o / -110u)
• Yankees vs Red Sox spread: Yankees -1.5 (+109), Red Sox +1.5 (-131)

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Yankees vs Red Sox MLB Betting Preview

New York Yankees

I generally like to keep my analysis on the field, but I might be remiss in not mentioning a recent ESPN report concerning Cam Schlittler’s family receiving death threats upon his return to Boston. (It can be easily googled.)

It’s simply that he’s from there, and people who don’t know how to participate in a civilized society have directed some violent and disturbing rhetoric towards him and his family.

There’s no analysis that can tell you how he’s going to react to this, but Schlittler’s said all the right things, and it's not the first time it’s happened. He famously handled himself tremendously in the postseason against his hometown team, but this will be his first time pitching in Boston as a New York Yankee.

Returning to things we can more easily evaluate, Schlittler has struck out 36 of the 105 batters he’s faced this year and walked only three, while allowing four barrels (6.1%). He’s even generating 47.7% of his contact on the ground.

Schlittler has reduced his fastball usage from 54.7% to 39.6%, while throwing more sinkers (7.2% to 24.2%), and the results have been tremendous.

Excluding a slider he’s thrown about five times, all four of his remaining pitches grade above average, including three above a 125 Pitching+ (ridiculous!), resulting in a 2.86 Bot ERA and 123 Pitching+ overall mark.

Those grades are sixth and second best among qualified pitchers this year (teammate Will Warren leads the league in both Bot ERA and Pitching+).

Opponents have failed to earn a run in three of Schlittler’s five starts, and his 1.95 ERA is within one-third of a run of all estimators except for a 2.59 dERA, which seems to run a bit high for many of the top pitchers. Still, if that’s the floor, you have one heck of a pitcher on your hands, which the Yankees certainly do.

Not only does Schlittler face a struggling Boston offense (74 wRC+ at home, 86 vs RHP, 80 L7 days even before they were shut out on Wednesday night), but the projected lineup (Rotowire) is averaging just an 83 wRC+ overall this year.

Also, Action PRO projects Schlittler for 6.7 strikeouts in this game.

The Red Sox are still looking for their first run of this series, and Roman Anthony missed Wednesday night’s game with a back issue. His availability for Thursday is not yet known.

The only pitch that Schlittler throws that the Red Sox grade above average against as a team this year is the curveball, and he only offers that 8.6% of the time.

Wilyer Abreu and Willson Contreras have each hit curveballs well since last year, but nobody in the Boston lineup (again and for the rest of this article, projected) has a positive run value matchup when considering Schlittler’s entire arsenal.

If the Red Sox do manage to reach base, they should be able to run on Austin Wells, who was a below-average thrower last year and has failed to catch any of the first seven attempts against him this year. Schlittler has been about average at holding runners, though he hasn’t gotten much practice.

However, Trevor Story is the only projected starter with more than one BRR that comes strictly from stealing bases since last year.

The projected Yankee defense has been slightly negative, mostly due to the infield components of Caballero (-2 Fielding Run Value) and Rosario (-2) on the left side. Chisholm, on the other side, has been their best defender (3 FRV).

The Yankee bullpen has been middling with a 3.72 FIP/4.03 xFIP/3.72 SIERA combo through the first four weeks of the season, but they are well rested. They had Monday off, no relievers threw more than 19 pitches on Tuesday, and then used just one reliever (Brent Headrick) on Wednesday. Having thrown both days, Headrick is likely the only Yankee reliever not available on Thursday.

Boston Red Sox

Originally scheduled to be Brayan Bello, the Red Sox pushed him back on Wednesday and gave us a big ole shrug emoji…

Luckily, Eduardo Rivera pitched 3.1 innings on Wednesday night in relief, narrowing the choice to very likely Payton Tolle, who made his major league debut with 16.1 innings split between the rotation and bullpen late last season.

Currently the 16th-ranked Fangraphs prospect in the league, Tolle posted an impressive 25.2 K% and 14.8 SwStr% with just three barrels (6.4%), despite only 34% of his contact on the ground, but also walked 10.8% of the batters he faced.

In three Triple-A starts this season, Tolle has been even more impressive with a 24.6 K-BB% and 36.8 HardHit%, but sensing this situation might come up, Boston skipped his last start to have him available here. Hence, he hasn’t pitched since April 12th.

Interestingly, Tolle threw his 96.6 mph heater 64.1% of the time at the major league level last season, but is only using it 24.1% of the time this year with 27.3% cutters, 26.4% sinkers, 11.8% curveballs and 10.5% changeups.

Much different from last year’s major league stint, when he threw no other pitch even 20% of the time and only one other pitch even 10%.

While we don’t have minor league pitch modeling, we can see why he threw his fastball so often last season (67 Pitching Bot overall, 120 Pitching+). Pure stuff marks were slightly better than command, leading to an overall 3.38 Bot ERA and 106 Pitching+ on the entire arsenal.

Fangraphs scouting measures his fastball already as an elite 70 current grade/80 future, but potentially Tolle’s only above-average pitch.

Most major projection systems (ZIPs, Steamer, the BAT) have him between 3.76 and 4.46 (ERA & FIP), averaging around 4.15.

The Yankees have just a 95 wRC+ against LHP going into Wednesday night, but that’s about double their mark just a week ago, while the projected lineup averages a 132 wRC+ and .232 ISO vs LHP since last season.

It’s a bit of a stars and scrubs group with Paul Goldschmidt (109), Aaron Judge (159), Cody Bellinger (140), Giancarlo Stanton (105) and Amed Rosario (121) all hitting the ball well this season overall, but the reaming four (Randal Grichuk, Jazz Chisholm Jr, Jose Caballero and Austin Wells) all no higher than a 75 wRC+.

Payton Tolle accumulated -1 Net Bases Prevented in his short time in the majors last year, which may suggest he’s below average at holding runners, though it’s far too small a sample size to put much confidence in.

The catching part is more complex. If Narvaez (9 Catchers CS Above Average since last year) starts, the Yankees will have a tough time running. Connor Wong (-2) has taken more playing time and is a much lesser defensive catcher, but has been swinging the bat much better than Narvaez this year.

Chisholm and Caballero are the two biggest base-stealing threats for New York, but they will have to find ways to get on base for it to matter.

The Red Sox are a solid defensive group, already at 7 Runs Prevented and 9 OAA with the projected lineup at 8 Fielding Run Value this season (with Narvaez). Willson Contreras (3) is the surprise leader in the latter category, tied with Narvaez. The catching decision would move the needle quite a bit defensively.

The Boston bullpen has been a bit of a problem. Not only have they been in the bottom half of the league (4.78 FIP/4.20 xFIP/3.989 SIERA, 14 HRs tied for fourth most), but this has been a heavily used group this week.

The entire pen was emptied on Monday after Sonny Gray left early with an injury. Eduardo Rivera did eat up most of the relief innings on Wednesday with Zack Kelly the only other reliever used, giving their highest leverage arms (Adolis Chapman, Garrett Whitlock, Danny Coulombe and Greg Weissert) haven’t a couple of days off since Monday’s affair.

Yankees vs Red Sox Pick, Betting Analysis

Based on several weather sources, the consensus forecast as of late Wednesday night is for temperatures in the mid to upper 50s, with a 7-10 mph wind blowing either across the field towards the right or slightly in from the left field corner/out towards the right field corner. It feels like slightly pitcher-friendly weather either way.

John Libka is a close-to-neutral pitch caller, leaning just slightly hitter-friendly, if at all.

Considering Fenway is the third-most-positive run environment in the league according to Statcast (3-year rolling), with a 109 Park Run Factor, we should still expect it to remain at least slightly positive when weather factors are considered.

Many people don’t realize it’s also a poor power environment, at least as far as home runs are concerned, slightly worse for LHBs (87 HR Factor) than RHBs (90).

While Payton Tolle has real prospect pedigree, Cam Schlittler is, by far, the superior pitcher in this game, perhaps by even a run or more, and with the better matchup. Tolle has a much wider range of outcomes, both for this season and for this game, but the projection is far more average than Schlittler's.

The Red Sox do have a decent defensive edge (especially if Narvaez catches), while the Yankees may hold a slight base running edge, though a lot of it depends on if some of their struggling hitters can even reach base.

I give the Yankees a slight bullpen edge both in terms of projections/performance and availability.

The market must feel comfortable enough with Tolle’s likelihood because most books have already posted a game line as of this writing. just a bit below where I make it around -160.

However, DraftKings is one of the very few books offering an F5 line this early, with the -140 price well below my threshold. I’m comfortable enough that the Red Sox won’t be throwing someone better than Tolle, even if it’s not him, to recommend a play at that price. Schlittler is the main component here, along with Yankee offensive superiority.

I would rather have confirmation on Tolle and the weather before considering the 8.5 total, but would lean slightly towards the under if forced to decide right now. One consideration could be the Red Sox under their team run total of 3.5, but that doesn’t leave much room for error in a tough park.

I’m aligned with the market on Schlittler’s strikeout prop at 6.5, priced slightly towards the over.

For now, we’ll just look for the Yankees to bring home the F5, but I’ll post any additional picks for this game on the app.

Pick: Yankees F5 ML (-140, 1u, DraftKings | Play to  -175, reduce to 0.5u above -160)

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