Gleyber Torres, Anthony Rizzo homer to back Nestor Cortes as Yankees beat Phillies
Yankees second baseman Gleyber Torres reacts after he scored on his solo home run against the Phillies during the third inning of an MLB game at Yankee Stadium on Monday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
No one tell the Yankees that it’s only a few days into April and that they still should be getting acclimated to the season. No one mention that it takes time to build chemistry, or that the various injuries to their pitching staff mean they’ll probably struggle a bit at the outset.
It’s not as if they’ll listen anyway.
The Yankees looked to be in prime midseason form on Monday. The Phillies? Well, mentally, they looked as if they still were at their spring training facility in Clearwater, Florida.
The result was Yankees domination: an 8-1 win at Yankee Stadium to give them three wins in the first four games. They hit well, fielded well, pitched well and provided a stark reminder of why they were so many people’s preseason favorites.
The Yankees scored in a host of ways, including their favorite: hitting the ball very, very far.
A season removed from hitting an MLB-leading 254 homers, the Yankees tacked on two more Monday, from Anthony Rizzo and Gleyber Torres, who went 2-for-2 with three walks. This, a day after getting one apiece from Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Kyle Higashioka. They have hit nine, matching the Giants, who bashed an eye-opening seven against the White Sox on Monday.
That, along with a strong outing by Nestor Cortes and a five-run fifth, was enough for the Yankees to make easy work of the Phillies despite being outhit 11-9. Every player in the starting lineup reached base at least once and the top six in the order scored.
Cortes allowed one run and seven hits in five innings with no walks and three strikeouts. Newest Yankee Ian Hamilton, Jonathan Loaisiga and Clay Holmes threw a combined four scoreless innings in relief. Former Met Taijuan Walker, meanwhile, was both hittable and unlucky. He gave up four runs and four hits in 4 1⁄3 innings.
The Phillies all but gifted the Yankees their first two runs in the first. The messy inning began with DJ LeMahieu lining a hit to center that was misplayed by Brandon Marsh, who tried to catch it on the fly but had it skitter below his glove and zip toward the wall for a generously-scored triple.
Walker then walked Aaron Judge and Rizzo to load the bases, and Stanton grounded to short to make it 1-0. Torres brought the second run home when he hit a soft line drive that deflected off Walker’s glove for an infield hit.
Torres kept it going in the third, teeing off on Walker’s 2-and-2 fastball, a 95-mph meatball that got walloped 361 feet to right for his 100th career homer.
“I think he’s been excellent,” Aaron Boone said. “I think his at-bat quality had been excellent, punctuated by tonight, where he’s on every time and going the other way. He’s got that kind of power to drive the ball the other way and he’s that kind of hitter, so it’s good to see him doing that.”
Torres, who said he struggled with being overly aggressive in the past, said he worked on his patience in spring training. It’s paying immediate dividends.
“I went to the WBC and those kinds of games are kind of like playoff games because it’s not about hitting many homers, it’s about being on base for the other guys,” he said. “It helped me a little bit in the process and also, the 10 games I played during spring training, I worked on those kind of things — just trying to be in control and being patient when I go to home plate.”
The Phillies made it 3-1 in the fourth when Alec Bohm doubled and Edmundo Sosa singled him home . They threatened in the fifth, but Cortes’ heads-up play saved him a run. With Marsh on second and two outs, J.T. Realmuto singled to right. Marsh tried to score and Franchy Cordero sailed the throw well over Jose Trevino’s head. Cortes was there to back up the play, though, and sidearmed a perfect throw to LeMahieu at third to nail Marsh.
The Yankees scored five more in the fifth behind Rizzo’s two-run shot inside the rightfield foul pole, Cordero’s two-run double and an RBI single by Trevino.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
