Yankees' Aaron Judge hits No. 53 as club wins seventh straight, still has chance to take AL East
The Yankees' Aaron Judge follows through on his first inning home run against the Orioles at Yankee Stadium on Saturday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
As the Yankees solidified their playoff standing in recent weeks and made an unexpected run at winning the AL East title — still very much a possibility heading into the final day of the regular season — manager Aaron Boone multiple times referenced his club collectively being “locked in” on the daily task at hand.
Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Cam Schlittler have been just that of late — Judge especially — and the trio led the Yankees to their seventh straight victory on Saturday afternoon, a 6-1 win over the Orioles at the Stadium that sent them into Game 162 with a real chance at taking the division title.
Toronto's 5-1 victory over the Rays later in the afternoon lifted the Blue Jays into a tie with the Yankees at 93-68 (the Jays own the tiebreaker advantage). The Yankees can finish first in the AL East by beating the Orioles on Sunday if the Rays defeat the Blue Jays. Otherwise, the Yankees will have the first wild card and begin a best-of-three Wild Card Series at home on Tuesday.
The Yankees have won 10 of 11 and have gone 31-12 since Aug. 11, but it might not be good enough to finish ahead of the Blue Jays.
“I feel like the guys are doing a good job of just taking care of what we can take care of,” said third baseman Ryan McMahon, whose 20th homer of the season (fourth with the Yankees) was a 401-footer that bounced off the top of the Yankees' bullpen wall, ricocheted off the back wall of the bullpen and made it 3-0 in the second inning. “We gotta go win tomorrow and that’s all we can really control, and then hopefully the dominoes fall our way.”
“It won’t matter either way,” said Judge, who put the Yankees ahead for good in the first inning with his 53rd homer of the season, a drive to leftfield against Tomoyuki Sugano that improved him to 7-for-8 with three homers against the righthander. “Our first goal [in spring training] was to win our division, so that gives us an opportunity to get a couple of more home games here for our fans. But the guys in this room, they’ll be happy either way. If it’s playing a wild card or a division [series], either will be fine.”
Stanton's 427-foot home run into the right-centerfield bleachers preceded McMahon's homer in the second and made it 2-0. It was career homer No. 453 for Stanton, who homered twice on Friday night, sending him past Carl Yastrzemski for 40th on the all-time list. He has three home runs and nine RBIs in the last three games.
Meanwhile, it was an event-filled afternoon in the Bronx.
It included Judge all but locking up his first career batting title — he’s hitting .331 after going 2-for-4 — and possible third career MVP; Boone’s MLB-leading seventh ejection of the season and, in a potential dark cloud to the day, second baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. leaving the game in the fifth after getting hit by a 97-mph pitch on his left forearm. The club announced that X-rays and a CT scan taken of Chisholm’s forearm came back negative.
Schlittler, the flame-throwing rookie righthander who is in a competition with Luis Gil for the third starter slot in the playoffs, did nothing to hurt his cause and may well have sewed it up for himself (Gil will start Sunday’s season finale). Schlittler threw his best game since taking over for the injured Clarke Schmidt in early July. With his fastball again sitting in the range of 98 to 99 mph, Schlittler (4-3, 2.96) allowed two hits and a walk in a season-high seven innings and struck out a season-high nine.
“Obviously, I knew the situation after yesterday [both the Blue Jays and Yankees won Friday] and coming into today,” Schlittler said. “There’s a little bit of pressure there, but that’s something I enjoy and something I want to pitch through.”
The game was over early as the Orioles (75-86), in the first two games of the series, were about as competitive as the U.S. Ryder Cup team at Bethpage Black.
Boone, who has led or been tied for the AL lead in ejections for five straight seasons, was run for the seventh time in the fifth after objecting to a pair of strike calls on Judge (both pitches appeared inside). Judge then stung a two-run single to center with the bases loaded to make it 5-0 and Cody Bellinger made it 6-0 with a sacrifice fly.
All of it set up what could be a memorable late Sunday afternoon in the Bronx.
“Kind of crazy,” Boone said. “162 games and whatever happens today [in Toronto], it’s going to come down to that last day. That’s baseball, Suzyn. That’s the beauty of our sport. Should make for an exciting day.”
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
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