Last night, the New York Yankees featured the real Gerrit Cole. Although Cole was 4-0 entering the night, he had struggled at times in his four wins. Last night was the dominant Gerrit Cole we have all been expecting. Cole had one bad pitch on the night that allowed a Red Sox a run. He allowed only one run in seven innings and 95 pitches.
The rest of the game at Yankee Stadium, in the Bronx, was all about the Yankee’s powerful offense. At the top of the first inning, Gerrit Cole made his Yankee Stadium debut against the Red Sox. Cole had never faced the Red Sox in a New York Yankee uniform. The action in the game started at the bottom of the third inning, when Red Sox Colten Brewer allowed Gleyber Torres to double to the base of the right-field wall, scoring Luke Voit and Aaron Hicks, and it was 2-0 Yankees, and the end of Brewer’s night.
At the top of the fourth Alex Verdugo took the first pitch he saw from Cole into the second deck of the right field. Cole’s only mistake of the game. At the bottom of the fifth inning, Brett Gardner stole second, followed by Mike Tauchman’s long grounder to left scoring Gardner. Gary Sanchez that has started to see the ball better, stepped to the plate and hit a 457′ bomb to left scoring Tauchman for the Yankee 5-1 lead.
At the bottom of the seventh, Tauchman again stepped the plate with two on and hit a base hit to center driving in Gio Urshela for the 6-1 lead. Also in the same frame, Clint Frazier that was just a triple from the cycle in his first game hit a ground roller to the left-field wall scoring Gleyber Torres and Mike Tauchman, and it was 8-1 Yankees.
The big Yankee blemish in the game was when Jonathan Holder came in replacing Cole, and gave up two runs in a third of an inning, making it Yankees 8 and the Red Sox 3. Adam Ottavino came in and cleaned up the inning by striking out two Sox. At the bottom of the frame, Brandon Workman loaded the bases, and again, Mike Tauchman doubles driving in LeMahieu and Luke Voit for the final score of Yankees 10 and the Red Sox 3.
The winning pitcher was Gerrit Cole, his fifth win in as many tries. The loser was Colten Brewer. There were several positive takeaways for the Yankees. One was that this was a real baseball game that featured the long ball and combination of timely small ball, that got the Yankees the win. Gleyber Torres, which has been mostly dormant at the plate, went four for four. Mike Tauchman continued to shine going three for five, with two doubles. Possibly the best news of the game is that Gary Sanchez who has been severely struggling hit his second home run in as many games.
The line was the New York Yankees 10 runs, 14 hits, and no errors. The Red Sox 3 runs 7 hits and one error. Tonight the Yankee’s James Paxton will face the Red Sox only good pitcher, ex-Yankee Nathan Eovaldi in a 7:07 pm game that will be nationally broadcast on the Fox Network.
For other takeaways from the game, read Alex Wilson’s article here.