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The Yankees continue to truck along. With their winning streak snapped, New York wasted no time trying to start a new one, in spite of the historic raft of players on the IL. That avalanche of injuries led the team to plug Gio Urshela into the cleanup spot, but no matter. James Paxton out-pitched Madison Bumgarner, and the Yankees opened their three-game set with the Giants with a 7-3 victory.
Things got off to a fortunate start for the Yankees. DJ LeMahieu hit a lazy foul fly, but Steven Duggar wasn’t able to make the catch after tripping over the bullpen mound. LeMahieu quickly turned around the at-bat by ripping a leadoff double. The slumping Gleyber Torres doubled to bring in the first run, and Urshela continued his offensive production with a single to move Torres to third. Cameron Maybin, making his Yankee debut, singled for his first hit and RBI, making it 2-0.
The Giants nicked Paxton for a run in the first inning, marking the only time this season they have scored in the first frame. During the second inning, Paxton quickly reverted back to form, striking out the side, all swinging. Starting with the final out of the first, Paxton retired ten straight batters, before Brandon Crawford singled to lead off the fifth. He quickly shut down the Giants’ chances by striking out the three following hitters.
On the other side, the Yankees’ offense kept chipping away at Bumgarner, putting across one run in the third and fifth, before finally knocking him out with two outs in the sixth. The Bombers had plenty of success off of Bumgarner, recording 11 hits across the left-hander’s 5.2 innings. LeMahieu, Voit, and Urshela all acquired two hits off the southpaw.
Paxton followed suit, exiting after 5.2 innings as well. Former Yankee Tyler Austin started the Giants’ sixth inning with a walk, Posey doubled to bring him in, and yet another former Yankee, Yangervis Solarte, singled to deliver the final blow to Paxton. He finished having thrown 106 pitches, striking out eight and walking two. Tommy Kahnle came in and ended any hopes of more Giants runs with a swinging strikeout of Brandon Crawford.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, Zack Britton got the first two outs without incident, but walked the next three hitters to load the bases. Once again, many fans might have thought the bullpen would make what was a 5-3 game a lot closer than necessary, but Adam Ottavino came through with a strikeout of Posey to end the threat.
As Aroldis Chapman was warming up for the bottom of the ninth, Luke Voit crushed a home run to straight away center field with DJ LeMahieu on second. Per Statcast, the ball traveled 414 feet, leaving the bat with an exit velocity of 108 mph. The two-run bomb extended the lead to 7-3, but the Yankees still went with Chapman in the non-save situation. Chapman worked around a leadoff walk for a scoreless ninth.
The Yankees’ six-game winning streak came to a disappointing end in Anaheim, but they quickly got right back on track. With the Red Sox and Rays postponed, the Yankees moved to within two games of the AL East lead. They’ll look to make even more progress tomorrow at 4:05 EST with J.A. Happ on the bump.