This time Anthony Mantha Jersey , the short porch at Yankee Stadium ended up hurting the home team.
Even with one of baseball’s tallest players posted at the wall.
Ronald Acuna Jr. hit a two-run homer in the 11th inning that nicked the glove of a leaping Aaron Judge in right field, and the Atlanta Braves beat the New York Yankees 5-3 on Monday in a matchup between the top teams in each league entering the night.
”It should give us a lot of confidence,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. ”It’s good for our young guys that come into a place like this against a team like this, as good as they are, and play well.”
Johan Camargo homered early and Jesse Biddle pitched out of a late jam for the NL East leaders, who followed up a three-game sweep in St. Louis with their fourth consecutive victory. Atlanta (49-34) is 15 games over .500 for the first time since the conclusion of the 2013 season.
New York (54-28) fell a game behind first-place Boston in the AL East.
The 20-year-old Acuna also doubled and drove in three runs, four years to the day after the touted rookie signed with the Braves.
”First time here at Yankee Stadium,” he said through a translator. ”First home run at Yankee Stadium is very special to me.”
Judge hit his 23rd homer and second in two nights. Gleyber Torres had three hits and scored twice, but the rookie second baseman’s 10th error since he was called up April 22 helped Atlanta get started in the 11th.
Playing on the outfield grass, Torres booted Nick Markakis‘ leadoff grounder. One out later, Acuna lofted a 1-2 pitch from David Robertson (5-3) the other way. Judge, all 6-foot-7 of him, got in good position at the auxiliary scoreboard and jumped, but the ball glanced off the tip of his webbing and cleared the fence.
”Tough play. I want to make that play for D-Rob and I wasn’t able to come through,” Judge said. ”That’s all it is, just a little timing. If I time it up right I make that play. On that one, I was just a little late.”
Robertson slumped near the mound as an excited Acuna circled the bases with his seventh home run – third in the past six games.
”Man, when he hit it I thought it was an out Darren Helm Jersey , to be honest with you,” Robertson said. ”Playing here at Yankee Stadium, you see it happen all the time. The short porch gets you in right field.”
Robertson had faced 182 right-handed batters without giving up a home run since Adam Rosales connected off him on June 25, 2017.
A.J. Minter got three outs for his fourth save .
”He’s got a save in Wrigley Field and Yankee Stadium. I mean, that’s pretty good for a first-year reliever,” Snitker said. ”And you can tell, he’s liking that situation, too. He doesn’t back down. He’s got a lot of confidence in himself.”
New York stranded 12 and went a season-worst 0 for 12 with runners in scoring position.
The Yankees had the bases loaded with one out in the 10th before Biddle (2-0) struck out Greg Bird and Austin Romine on seven pitches. The left-hander fanned four in two scoreless innings.
”These fans are pretty loud, and I was just trying to quiet them down,” Biddle said.
Aroldis Chapman struck out the side in the ninth for the Yankees, hitting a season-high 104 mph on the stadium radar gun to oohs and aahs from the crowd of 43,792. Dellin Betances retired slugger Freddie Freeman with runners at the corners to end the 10th.
Judge hit a pop-fly homer to right in the first and has gone deep in four of his last six games. Camargo answered with a leadoff shot in the third against rookie starter Jonathan Loaisiga, who was sent to the minors after the game.
Braves right-hander Anibal Sanchez allowed three runs in six innings.
ROSTER SHUFFLE
Loaisiga was optioned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to open a spot for RHP A.J. Cole (neck strain), who will be reinstated from the disabled list Tuesday. Yankees manager Aaron Boone said there’s a good chance Loaisiga will return next Monday to start in a doubleheader at Baltimore.
ALL IN THE FAMILY
With the international signing period open, the Yankees landed the younger brother of ace pitcher Luis Severino. Rafael Severino is a 19-year-old right-hander from the Dominican Republic who will start out at the club’s academy there.
”Yippee. Sign me up for that,” Boone said. ”Definitely good to have another Severino in the mix.”
The elder Severino, who is 13-2 with a 1.98 ERA, leads the majors in wins and the AL in ERA. He said he was excited Duncan Keith Jersey , and happily delivered the news to his kid brother.
”He was flipping out. He didn’t believe it,” Luis Severino told reporters . ”I think he’s going to be really good.”
TRAINER’S ROOM
Braves: Reliever Peter Moylan was placed on the 10-day DL with a strained right forearm and RHP Matt Wisler was optioned to Triple-A Gwinnett. OF Michael Reed and RHP Evan Phillips were called up from Triple-A. … Arodys Vizcaino (right shoulder inflammation) threw a bullpen and could come off the disabled list Tuesday. Vizcaino, who has 15 saves, has been sidelined since June 21.
Yankees: RHP Masahiro Tanaka (two strained hamstrings) threw a bullpen and is scheduled to make a rehab start Wednesday at Triple-A. He could rejoin the team early next week in Baltimore – perhaps in time to pitch in the doubleheader. … As a precaution, Romine (left hamstring) was out of the starting lineup for the second consecutive night. He entered at catcher in the ninth. Romine will likely start one of the next two games, Boone said.
As they stagger toward the midpoint of their miserable 2018 baseball season, the Orioles own the worst record in the majors and are on pace to lose 100 games for only the third time since their move to Baltimore in 1954.
Worst of all, they never saw it coming.
After giving free agent Alex Cobb a four-year, $57 million contract and signing veteran right-hander Andrew Cashner, the Orioles figured they had a solid starting rotation to go with a power-laden lineup – a formula designed to produce the team’s fourth postseason berth in seven years under manager Buck Showalter.
”We had really high hopes, as most teams do, especially in spring training,” slugger Mark Trumbo said. ”Our offense was really firing, and we had both Cashner and Cobb coming into the fold to go with a similar group of guys from the last couple years.”
Nothing has gone according to plan. Entering Friday night’s game in Atlanta, the Orioles were 21-52 (10-29 on the road) and a whopping 29 games behind the first-place New York Yankees in the AL East. The last time a team has been at least 30 games behind at the end of June was 1979, when Toronto was looking way up at the Orioles.
”It’s kind of mind-boggling,” reliever Zach Britton said. ”It’s tough. We thought we’d be fighting for a playoff spot, and we’re not even halfway through and we’re already close to being mathematically eliminated from playoff contention.
”I can’t remember being in this type of situation here Authentic Jordan Akins Jersey , maybe my first year in 2011 when we were pretty bad from the get-go. But I don’t even think it was this bad, and this roster has a lot of talent on it.”
Injuries have been a factor. Trumbo and Britton began the season on the disabled list, third baseman Tim Beckham has been sidelined since April 24 and 2017 All-Star second baseman Jonathan Schoop missed three weeks with an oblique strain. Outfielder Colby Rasmus languished on the 60-day disabled list before hitting a home run Thursday in his first action since April 6.
But the core of the problem has been, quite simply, poor performances by the vast majority of the team – most notably two-time AL home run champion Chris Davis, who’s in the third season of a seven-year, $161 million contract.
Davis is batting .150 with four homers and 15 RBIs in 57 games. He is slated to return to the lineup on Friday night following a hiatus of nearly two weeks during which he worked to get his mojo back.
But Davis isn’t the only underachiever. Schoop has a .209 batting average, starting catcher Caleb Joseph is at .172, Trey Mancini is hitting at a .220 clip (down from .293 as a rookie last year) and the collective batting average of .227 is tied for last in the big leagues with Arizona. Baltimore has been blanked eight times, and no team in the majors has scored fewer runs.
”I can’t remember having a team with so many guys who haven’t swung the bats as they have in the past, or the way they are expected to produce over the course of a full season,” Showalter said.
The best hitters on the team are Manny Machado (.304, 18 HRs, 53 RBIs) and Adam Jones (.292, 10, 31), both of whom are in the final year of their contracts and likely to be dealt before the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline.
It would take exceptional pitching to offset Baltimore’s meager offensive output, and that hasn’t happened. Cobb is 2-9 with a 7.14 ERA Authentic Lorenzo Carter Jersey , Cashner is 2-8 and Gausman (3-6) has gone seven straight starts without a victory.
”I’ve never been a part of a team like this,” Gausman said. ”Ever since I came up (in 2013), we’ve been a winning ball club and a contender. So, this is really weird.”
Seems as if there’s no option but to tear it down and start over, beginning with some heavy trading action before July 31.
”If you just run the same roster out there the whole year, you don’t do yourself any justice,” said the 30-year-old Britton, who’s in the final season of his contract and a likely trading chip. ”It’s unfortunate for some of the guys who are going to be affected by it, but it’s the nature of the beast. When you don’t play well, people get replaced by younger players.”
Showalter and vice president of baseball operations Dan Duquette are also in the last year of their contracts, but situation likely won’t be addressed until the offseason.
Regardless, change is coming for a franchise still in search of its first World Series title since 1983.
”Sad to see it happen,” Gausman said. ”Obviously, I would love for us all to stay here and ride off into the sunset together. But at this point, that’s kind of unrealistic.”