The future is here and it is… now. Nathan Eovaldi looked lights out for most of his outing to earn his 13th win, and, of course, Greg Bird’s pair of two-run homers drove in all the runs that the Yankees needed. Oh, and the Yankees took a series sweep against the Twins, which is pretty neat. They won 4-2.
Bye, bye Birdie
In the bottom of fourth, with two outs and Carlos Beltran on first, Greg Bird went deep against Ervin Santana for his first ML home run and boy, it was not a cheapie. Bird clobbered a changeup up in the zone and deposited it into the second deck in right. Oh, and New York led 2-0.
Sterling’s call? “Bye bye, Birdie! Here he is, the Birdman of New York.”
In the sixth inning, in the same situation (two outs and Beltran on first), Bird went yard again. This time, he took a 92 mph fastball up the middle and didn’t miss any of it. The Yankees, trailing 3-2 before the home run, took a 4-3 lead for good.
Also, as for his swing, I thought it looked a lot like Shawn Green’s, which is not a bad company for a comparison. Take a look:
Nathan Eovaldi retired the first 16 batters he faced. He didn’t allow a single baserunner until one out in the sixth inning, when Chris Herrmann fought off an inside fastball for a bloop single.
Eovaldi had a lot of things going on in today’s game. First off – he had his swing-and-miss stuff working. He got a total of 15 whiffs today – seven each from four-seamer and splitter and one from slider – and struck out eight in seven innings. He definitely pitched like a guy who can throw 100 mph. Speaking of which, he was just pumpin’ it today – per Beyond the Box Score, Eovaldi threw 28 pitches over 100 mph. That is just nuts. He also topped out at 102.4 mph per BrooksBaseball, which is also incredible considering that he’s a non-Aroldis Chapman pitcher.
Oh, and also important – he was throwing strikes. He put 83 pitches out of 120 into the strikezone, good for a 69.2 strike percentage – a nice number.
In the top of sixth, however, things became a bit tense. After Herrmann broke up the perfecto, Shane Robinson followed it up with another single. Aaron Hicks grounded out to third – on a play that required a very, very nice pick and throw from Chase Headley – to make it two outs and two runners in scoring position. Brian Dozier worked a full count walk to get the bases loaded and Joe Mauer singled on a 1-2 slider to tie the game, 2-2.
Eovaldi gave up another 3-2 count walk to Miguel Sano. Next up, Trevor Plouffe. On a 1-2 count, Plouffe hit a soft grounder that was just soft enough that no fielder could reach it before another run scored, 3-2. So, to summarize this inning – death by soft hits, a Joe Mauer single, and full count walks. Brutal. But that’s baseball – things can unravel very, very quickly.
Fortunately, Eovaldi had a very nice bounceback inning in the seventh after the Yanks took a lead on another Bird homer. He retired all three Twins – Eduardo Escobar, Herrmann and Robinson – in a row to mark a tidy end to a good start.
Leftovers
I gotta tell you – I was biting my nails a bit with two outs in the eighth when Chasen Shreve walked Joe Mauer and had to face Miguel Sano. Well, there’s definitely that preconceived notion that right-handed hitters are stronger versus lefty pitchers but in Sano’s case (though he hasn’t played in ML so much yet), he has struggled relatively against the southpaws (93 wRC+) while murdering the righties (196 wRC+). And, just like that, Shreve struck him out in five pitches to get out of the inning.
Dellin Betances picked up his eighth save of the year after striking out two in a three-up, three-down ninth inning. With 101 K’s in the season, he became the first Yankee reliever to have a back-to-back 100+ K seasons (135 last year).
Box score, standings, highlights and WPA
Here’s today’s box score, updated standings, video highlights and WPA.
Source: FanGraphs
Tomorrow, the Yankees will welcome the Indians in Bronx for a four-game home series. It’s nice to start a homestand with a sweep and, hopefully, the momentum will roll for the Bombers onto the next. Enjoy the rest of your hump day!
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