YANKEES TAKE 2 OUT OF 3 AGAINST GUARDIANS
- April Claudio, Contributor
On Tuesday the Yankees hosted the Guardians for a 3 game series. The game started off with both teams in first place and with Luis Gil and Matthew Boyd on the mound and ended with the Yankees using 8 pitchers from their bullpen and the Guardians using 6. Juan Soto and Aaron Judge hit back to back home runs in the first inning and Gil gave up a bunch of singles in the first three innings which made the score 2-2 going into the fourth inning. Gil allowed a home run by Brayan Rocchio and a walk before leaving the game with back tightness. Anthony Volpe hit a RBI double the same inning tying the game for a second time. Despite both teams using several pitchers from their bullpens the game stayed tied and went into extra innings. It wasn’t until the 12th inning that a team scored. Unfortunately the Guardians scored 6 runs and the Yankees only scored 2. All the runs by the Guardians were just done by a pair of singles, a double and a triple. The Yankees two runs were from a double by Judge. The Yankees pitchers combined walked 14 Guardians. Final score was 9-5, Guardians win.
Game 2 saw Nestor Cortes on the mound against Joey Cantillo. Cortes had another great outing, pitching 7 innings and gave up 0 runs, 3 hits and struck out 4 to earn his 7th win of the season. Cantillo, on the other hand, gave up 7 runs in 4 innings. The Yankees went up 2-0 in the first inning with Juan Soto hitting a 2 run home run. Aaron Judge also hit a 2 run home run in the third inning. In the fourth inning Alex Verdugo and Oswald Peraza walked and Gleyber Torres hit a single. Then comes Juan Soto who hit a double which all 3 of them scored on before Soto got thrown out trying to stretch into a triple. Judge hit his second home run of the night in the seventh inning. Jhonkensy Noel scored the Guardians only run with a home run in the eighth inning. Final score 8-1, Yankees won.
Judge became the third player in Yankee history to hit 47 home runs in first 127 games of the season. Soto tied his season high of 5 RBIs.
Also on Wednesday, Luis Gil was placed on the IL. Clarke Schmidt is set to do a rehab start on Friday with Double-A Somerset and should rejoin the team soon. Anthony Rizzo is also doing a rehab assignment with Somerset this weekend.
The last game of the series the Yankees shut out the Guardians with Gerrit Cole getting the start. Cole pitched 6 innings, gave up 1 hit and struck out 5. Pitching for the Guardians was Gavin Williams. He pitched 4 1/3 innings and gave up 3 runs on 4 hits and 4 walks and 5 strikeouts. The first run scored wasn’t until the fourth inning, a solo home run by Aaron Judge. Ben Rice scored on a sacrifice fly by Austin Wells in the fifth inning which was followed up with a 3 run home run by Giancarlo Stanton. Anthony Volpe also scored on a sacrifice fly by Ben Rice in the eighth inning. The Yankees won 6-0 and Cole earned his 150th win.
Jazz Chisholm Jr. is set to rejoin the team Friday as the Yankees kickoff a 3 game series against the Colorado Rockies.