Yankees’ power draws matchup with Red Sox
Judge and Stanton homer as New York wins the wild-card game for the second year in a row.
NEW YORK — Aaron Judge got the party started with a two-run homer nine pitches in. Luis Severino let out a primal scream after escaping a bases-loaded jam with 100-mph heat. Giancarlo Stanton capped the mauling with monstrous drive in his postseason debut.
From the first inning on, there was little doubt. Next stop for the Yankees: Fenway Park and the rival Red Sox.
Going ahead quickly against reliever-turned-starter Liam Hendriks, the Yankees pounded the Oakland Athletics 7-2 Wednesday night to win their second consecutive AL wild-card game.
“I was already excited from the national anthem on,” said Judge, who hit his second homer since returning in mid-September after missing seven weeks with a broken right wrist.
Severino atoned for flopping in his postseason debut last year, and late-season spark Luke Voit added a two-run triple off Blake Treinen in a four-run sixth, missing a home run by inches. Stanton added 443foot drive off the Oakland closer in the eighth that landed in left field’s second deck, completing a power show by the team that set a major league record for home runs in a season.
After one of those boisterous Bronx celebrations that used to be an October staple, the Yankees will take a train to Boston for a best-offive Division Series starting Friday, a matchup of 100-win heavyweights. By the late innings, the sellout crowd was chanting “We want Boston!”
“This place was crazy tonight,” Stanton said. “Everything I would have expected and more.”
Said Oakland manager Bob Melvin: “Early in the game they're going to be loud. It's our job to try to take them out of it.
“This is a tough ballpark to play in.”
Severino struck out seven his first time through the batting order, but wound up walking four as he pitched carefully. Dellin Betances got out of a jam in the fifth.
“I've been waiting for this moment a long time. Last year I was a cheerleader,” Betances said, ref lecting on his reduced role last October after late-season control problems.
For Oakland, it the latest disappointing defeat in what has stretched into decades of disappointment. The A’s have lost eight straight winner-take-all postseason games since beating Willie Mays and the New York Mets in Game 7 of the 1973 World Series, and dropped all four of their postseason matchups against the Yankees.
“We’ve had a tough time with it,” Melvin said. “And it’s frustrating.”
New York became the first team since the 2001 A’s to reach triple digits in wins and fail to finish first — the Red Sox set a team record with 108 victories.