Aaron Judge ended the longest home run drought of his career with a go-ahead grand slam in the seventh inning that rallied the New York Yankees past the Boston Red Sox 5-4 on Friday night.
The star slugger had gone 16 games and 75 plate appearances without a longball before launching a clutch drive into the lower left-field seats off reliever Cam Booser (2-3) for a 5-4 advantage.
New York extended its AL East lead to three games over Baltimore, held hitless for 8 2/3 innings by four Tigers pitchers in a 1-0 loss at Detroit. It is the Yankees' largest cushion since they led by 3 1/2 games before a June 15 defeat at Boston that started a 4-14 slide.
The fading Red Sox (74-74) began the night 4 1/2 games behind Minnesota for the league's last wild card.
Mark Leiter Jr. (4-5) got four outs in relief of starter Clarke Schmidt for the win. Luke Weaver struck out five in two scoreless innings for his second career save.
