BOSTON (AP) — New York Yankees right-hander Cam Schlittler wants to see the rivalry with the Red Sox return to its more passionate heyday.
Schlittler, who grew up in the Boston area as a Red Sox fan and went to college in the city at Northeastern, said before the teams met for the first time this season that the rivalry is “heading in the right direction” after they met in the playoffs again last year.
“It’s intense. The atmosphere’s great,” Schlittler said before Tuesday’s game. “When you’re playing a division rival, you’re going to perform at the best level. And if for some guys that rivalry feeds them a little bit, like I think it does for me, then great.”
Schlittler told the New York Post this week that he and his family have received death threats leading up to his scheduled start for the Yankees at Fenway Park on Thursday night. But he said on Tuesday that he was “not overly concerned.”
“Just looking forward to Thursday,” he told reporters in the visitor’s clubhouse. “I’ve got a job to do. I don’t want to create a distraction for the team. So I’m just going to go out there and do what I need to do on the mound.”
The Yankees said they had made no special security arrangements because of the threats. When Schlittler came out of the dugout during batting practice, the only shouts were from children wanting his autograph.
A Red Sox spokesperson said the team doesn’t comment on specific security protocols.
“The safety of all players, staff, and fans is always our top priority,” the team said. “We have well-established procedures and significant resources in place for every game to ensure a safe environment.”
A Walpole, Massachusetts, native who was called up by the Yankees last July, Schlittler did not pitch against the Red Sox in the regular season. After his family was targeted with social media comments during the AL wild-card series, he responded with a victory in the Game 3 clincher at Yankee Stadium, striking out 12 in eight scoreless innings.
This season, he is 2-1 with a 1.95 ERA heading into Thursday’s start.
Schlittler said on Tuesday that he wasn’t sure how people back home would treat him now that he pitched for their archrival. But being back in the area over the offseason for a few months, he encountered no problems.
“They were great. People were very respectful,” he said. “It gives you some good feelings that it’s really just the people online that aren’t respectful. Typical Boston fans that are everyday guys, they’re not they’re going to give you too much to worry about in person.”
Schlittler said the last time he pitched off the mound at Fenway was his senior year in high school.
“Growing up Red Sox fan, it was definitely really cool,” he said.
Yankees manager Aaron Boone, whose homer in the deciding game of the 2003 AL Championship Series marked a high point in the rivalry — at least from New York’s perspective — said he wasn’t worried about how Schlittler would respond if he gets an unwelcome greeting from the Boston fans.
“He handles it quite well,” Boone said.
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New York Yankees' Cam Schlittler pitches during the third inning of a baseball game against the Kansas City Royals Friday, April 17, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)
New York Yankees pitcher Tim Hill warms up before the start of a baseball game against the Boston Red Sox, on Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Boston. (AP Photo/CJ Gunther)
The prospect of a second round of talks was uncertain Tuesday after Iran’s chief negotiator said Iran would not negotiate in the face of threats while U.S. President Donald Trump offered mixed messages about the path ahead for the U.S. war against Iran, declaring that he was in no rush to end the conflict.
Mohammed Bagher Qalibaf, Iran’s chief negotiator and parliament speaker, wrote in a post on X early Tuesday that “We do not accept negotiations under the shadow of threats,” and the Islamic Republic has been preparing “to reveal new cards on the battlefield.”
Trump indicated that he still expects to dispatch his negotiating team, led by U.S. Vice President JD Vance, to Pakistan’s capital of Islamabad for talks, even as Iran insisted it would not take part until the U.S. leader dialed back his demands. Trump said he’s “highly unlikely” to renew the ceasefire before it expires Wednesday.
Since the war started, fighting has killed at least 3,375 people in Iran and more than 2,290 in Lebanon. Additionally, 23 people have died in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Fifteen Israeli soldiers in Lebanon and 13 U.S. service members throughout the region have been killed.
Here is the latest:
Iran said Tuesday it hanged a man convicted over allegedly setting fire to a mosque in northern Tehran during nationwide protests in January.
The judiciary’s Mizan news agency identified the man as Amir Ali Mir Jafari.
There was no immediate information about Jafari among activists who follow Iran.
Iran has been accused of repeatedly holding closed-door trials against suspects who can’t challenge the evidence placed against them.
Iran already has hanged people from the January protests, something that U.S. President Donald Trump had described as a red line before the recent war.
Shares are mixed in Asia and oil prices have slipped following the latest rise of U.S.-Iran tensions.
The lackluster start to trading Tuesday followed a modest retreat on Wall Street.
On Monday, the S&P 500 slipped 0.2% from its all-time high and the Dow industrials edged less than 0.1% lower. The Nasdaq composite fell 0.3%.
The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil remains above $95.
Trump attacked critics after a second round of talks with Iran was thrown into doubt by the U.S. Navy’s seizure of an Iranian-flagged cargo ship.
Financial markets have had vicious swings, both up and down, since the war began because of uncertainty about how long it may last.
The fear is that a long-term disruption could keep so much oil and natural gas off global markets that it creates a punishing wave of inflation for the global economy.
A woman mourns as other hold portraits of Hezbollah fighters, who were killed before the ceasefire in the war between Hezbollah and Israel, during a mass funeral procession in the southern village of Kfar Sir, Lebanon, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A police officer walks past billboards near the Serena Hotel ahead of the second round of negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)
A woman carries her dog as a cleric walks on a sidewalk in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
FILE - U.S. Vice President JD Vance, center, walks up a flight of stairs to meet with Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Saturday, April 11, 2026, in Islamabad, for talks about Iran. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, pool, File)
Hezbollah supporters hang portraits of Hezbollah fighters killed in Israeli airstrikes during their funeral procession in the southern village of Kfar Sir, Lebanon, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
FILE - Donald Trump is sworn in as the 47th president of the United States by Chief Justice John Roberts as Melania Trump holds the Bible during the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Jan. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, Pool, File)
A police officer walks past billboards near the Serena Hotel ahead of the second round of negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)
A man on a scooter flashes a victory sign as he drives past a giant portrait depicting the war in the Middle East triggered by the U.S.-Israel strikes on Iran on Feb. 28, in the southern village of Kfar Sir, Lebanon, on Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Police officers stand guard at a checkpoint on a barricaded ahead of the second round of negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)
President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Saturday, April 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
Women share a moment as they look at a smartphone at the main gate of the Tehran University as a banner shows portraits of the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, right, and the late revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini in Tehran, Iran, Sunday, April 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A woman talks on her cellphone as she walks past a billboard showing Rais Ali Delvari, a national hero in an early 1900 uprising against British forces in southern Iran in the Persian Gulf, right, and the late Revolutionary Guard's navy chief Alireza Tangsiri, who was killed in the U.S.-Israeli strike in late March 2026, commanding the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, on a building at a square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Monday, April 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A man mourns over the coffin of a Hezbollah fighter who was killed in the war between Hezbollah and Israel during a mass funeral in Bazouriyeh village, south Lebanon, Monday, April 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
