HOUSTON — With simply two weeks to go earlier than the commerce deadline, one of the best document in baseball and an enormous lead within the division, the Yankees acquired one other reminder that the Astros are going to be an enormous impediment to their World Series hopes. Astros pitchers held the Bombers’ offense to only two runs over 18 innings and confirmed the weak spot within the Yankees pitching.
While Jordan Montgomery was strong within the first sport of the cut up doubleheader at Minute Maid Park, the Bombers bats had been quieted by Cristian Javier and the bullpen. Domingo German was not precisely substitute for Luis Severino whereas he’s on the injured listing. The Astros’ JJ Matijevic’s pinch hit single with two outs within the backside of the ninth inning gave the Astros a 3-2 win within the first sport. Home runs from Yordan Alvarez, Alex Bregman and Chas McCormick early made even the late three-run bomb by Aaron Judge irrelevant as Houston beat the Bombers within the evening cap 7-5.
With the sweep of the doubleheader, the Astros (61-32) are three wins behind the Yankees (64-29) within the American League race for one of the best document.
“That’s huge, huge,” Giancarlo Stanton mentioned. “The home-field advantage is definitely important. So we gotta make sure we get it.”
That comes with having one of the best document within the American League.
This counts because the fifth sequence they’ve misplaced this season (which incorporates the one sport they misplaced right here June 30 as a part of the make-up of the sequence misplaced originally of the season to the house owners’ lockout). They dropped the season sequence to the Astros, which might be a tiebreaker if the groups completed with the identical document.
That might issue large within the Yankees playoff hopes.
The Astros have been the Yankees playoff Kryptonite, with the Bombers shedding the AL Championship Series to them in each 2017 and 2019 and the Wild Card Game in 2015.
“We’ll definitely have to get through them, as well as other great teams to get to where we want to,” Stanton mentioned. “Like I said, every game is important…we’ll roll out of here and then we won’t worry about it until we need to.”
What the Yankees do want to fret about is their rotation.
Luis Severino went down with a strained lat muscle proper earlier than the All-Star break. German was their insurance coverage plan coming into the season, however he didn’t look sharp Thursday evening. It simply created extra urgency for the Yankees’ hunt for pitching earlier than the Aug. 2 commerce deadline. In his first begin since July 31, 2021, German allowed 5 earned runs on six hits in three innings. He walked one and struck out two. German gave up back-to-back homers to Alvarez and Bregman within the first. JP Sears, who allowed a two-run homer to McCormick within the sixth, didn’t stroll a batter and struck out one in three innings of labor.
Gleyber Torres hit his fifteenth homer of the season within the third for the Yankees’ two runs. Judge’s thirty fourth of the season, within the high of the ninth hit the home windows over the stands and prepare tracks in left area.
It was a disheartening loss after the Yankees had battled it out to the tip within the first sport.
Alex Bregman led off with a first-pitch single and Aledmy Diaz doubled off Michael King to place runners in scoring place with no outs within the backside of the inning. King struck out Yuli Gurriel, earlier than the Yankees deliberately walked Yordan Alvarez to load the bases. King acquired one other out earlier than giving up the game-winning single.
Montgomery held the Astros to 2 runs on seven hits. He walked one and struck out eight. It was his seventeenth begin permitting three earned runs or much less, tied for probably the most this season.
He gave up an RBI-single to Bregman within the first and a run-scoring double within the second to catcher Korey Lee.
“They’re really talented throughout their lineup, which is full of good hitters,” Montgomery mentioned. “Just a lot of guys that compete, they play the game hard so we just gotta play good baseball to beat them.”
DJ LeMahieu lined his ninth residence run of the season off Cristian Javier within the fifth inning of the primary sport. That snapped 11 innings that the Bombers had been held scoreless by the Astros’ proper hander. It was one in every of simply two hits the Yankees acquired off Javier in 5 innings of labor.
“I thought we had actually good at bats against Javier today too,” Yankees supervisor Aaron Boone mentioned. ” We had an opportunity to punch by means of with good at-bats by (Matt) Carpenter and Gleyber (Torres) there. You know the place they hit the ball laborious however couldn’t couldn’t get by means of there. Their bullpen was fairly robust in opposition to us at this time too.”
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Source: www.bostonherald.com