BOSTON — Red Sox’ Carlos Narváez committed his league-leading sixth catcher’s interference in the third inning Friday.
It was costly, leading to an unearned run in a 4-1 loss to the Yankees at Fenway Park.
The Red Sox lead MLB with nine catcher’s interference calls. No other MLB team has more than six.
“It’s something that you live with,” manager Alex Cora said. “You understand what we’re trying to accomplish. And numbers-wise, we’re a lot better than last year.”
Catcher’s interference occurs when the bat hits the catcher’s glove on a swing.
It’s happening more often due to a focus on pitch framing and efforts to steal and preserve strikes.
“We see the numbers and it’s worked to our advantage,” Cora said.
Narváez has been excellent at pitch framing, ranking in the 89th percentile (5) in the majors. Connor Wong also has been better at framing this year, ranking in the 51st percentile (0) after finishing in the ninth percentile (-7) last year.
“He (Narváez) was actually trying to get the pitch to throw to second. He wasn’t trying to frame the pitch,” Cora said.
Judge walked with two outs and nobody on base. Ben Rice then reached on Narváez’s catcher’s interference, and Cody Bellinger hit an RBI single to make it 2-0.