The New York Yankees, last night completed the sweep of the four-game series with the Boston Red Sox. Again, the Yankees combined small ball with homers to sweep the Red Sox for the second time in this shortened season. If you could sit in the stands, or you were at home before the game, you would have looked at one of the more unusual Yankee lineups. You could call it the B squad, as it was missing leadoff hitter D.J. LeMahieu, and sluggers Aaron Judge, and Giancarlo Stanton who are all on the IL.
The lineup had Aaron Hicks leading off for the first time this year, it also included callups Thairo Estrada, Miguel Andujar, Tyler Wade, and Erik Katz catching. B squad or not, it made no difference, as the next man up mentality kicked in, and all did their job. Well, maybe not all, Gleyber Torres exhibited some very sloppy play in the field. He missed a pop fly that he should have caught, and committed two throwing errors, and another bad throw that should have been an error.
Thairo Estrada and Aaron Hicks homered in the game, and Luke Voit had a two-homer game. Jordan Montgomery, coming off a win against the Atlanta Braves, started the game for the Yankees. He pitched effectively for 3.2 innings before the game went into rain delay. The one hour and 26-minute delay would not allow him to pitch deeper into the game. He allowed three hits, one earned run while striking out four.
The scoring started in the bottom of the second inning when Tyler Wade walked. Aaron Hicks doubled driving in Wade for the first Yankee run of the game. Luke Voit who has the second-highest slugging percentage against the Red Sox in history, slammed a two-run homer driving in Hicks for the Yankees 3-0 lead in the second inning. At the top of the fourth, when Torres missed a catch he should have caught, the miss allowed the Red Sox to score a run before the tarp was rolled out, as it started pouring.
After the rain delay, Luis Avilan took over for Montgomery and loaded the bases, but got out of it with a strikeout. In the bottom of the fourth Thairo Estrada hit a long ball into the stands, followed by Luke Voit hitting his second home run of the game, in the bottom of the fifth. In the bottom of the seventh, Aaron Hicks homered for his second home run of the season off the face of the second deck in right field. That ended the Yankee scoring in the game.
The long-awaited return of Aroldis Chapman happened in the ninth inning, but in his season debut, he proved he was a bit rusty, even though his fastball hit 101 mph. He gave up a run but struck out two Sox, and that was the game. Final score, New York Yankees 6 and the Red Sox 3. The win completed the sweep of the Red Sox.
The major takeaways in the game include the ability of the New York Yankees to win even when their best players are not in the lineup. The depth of the Yankee bench made it possible to continue to win. Although the Yankees have played small ball this year, they continue to lead the American League in home runs (40). On the bad side, shortstop Gleyber Torres has to clean up his act in the infield. Michael King got the win and Martin Perez took the loss in the game.
The Yankees lead the East Division and all of baseball going 16-6, the only other team with a winning percentage over .700 is the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Yankees with the momentum of winning seven games in a row will face the Tampa Bay Rays for the first game of a three-game set at Yankee Stadium tomorrow.