The Cleveland Guardians will try to win their third straight game overall and take the series against the visiting New York Yankees on Tuesday.
The Guardians opened the three-game set with a 3-2 win on Monday in which they mustered just four hits but drew nine walks and got a solid outing by Shane Bieber.
Josh Naylor hit a tiebreaking sacrifice fly in the seventh inning for the decisive run before Cleveland’s bullpen took care of the rest. Bieber (1-0) allowed five hits to go along with four strikeouts and three walks before being relieved by James Karinchak to start the eighth.
Karinchak gave up a triple to Gleyber Torres, but he induced Aaron Judge to pop out before striking out Anthony Rizzo and Giancarlo Stanton to escape unscathed. Emmanuel Clase pitched a perfect ninth for his third save of the season.
Torres went 2-for-3 with a run and a walk for New York, but no other Yankee had more than one hit.
With the game tied 2-2 in the seventh, Steven Kwan led off with a walk before stealing second. Amed Rosario walked before being forced out at second on Jose Ramirez’s groundout to shortstop. But Naylor followed with a sacrifice fly to center to score Kwan.
Mike Zunino went 3-for-3 with three doubles, an RBI and a walk, while Myles Straw was the only other Guardian to record a hit.
Yankees reliever Ian Hamilton (0-1), who gave up the decisive run in the seventh, allowed a hit with three strikeouts and three walks over two innings.
The Yankees hope they get a much better outing from Tuesday’s starter, Gerrit Cole (2-0, 0.73 ERA), than they got out of Domingo German on Monday. German struggled mightily with his command, as he allowed two runs (one earned) on two hits to go along with five walks and no strikeouts in just three innings.
Cole was fantastic in each of his first two starts of the season. The right-hander pitched six shutout innings with 11 strikeouts and two walks in a 5-0 win over the San Francisco Giants on March 30. He then gave up just a run on three hits with eight strikeouts and three walks in 6 1/3 innings in a 4-2 win over the Philadelphia Phillies this past Wednesday.
“Well, he’s Gerrit Cole,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said after Cole’s last start. “He walks out there with a lot of equipment but I feel like he’s been in a good spot since Day One of spring training and he’s carried it right into the season.
“He had a little bit of everything going today. I thought his fastball was really good, command-wise. He was sharp, and he’s throwing the ball real well.”
Cole is 5-2 with a 3.15 ERA with 60 strikeouts and 13 walks in eight career starts spanning 54 1/3 innings against Cleveland.
The Guardians will counter with right-hander Hunter Gaddis (0-0, 3.72 ERA), who allowed just one hit to go along with four strikeouts and two walks over six scoreless innings in a 6-4 win in 10 innings over Oakland last Wednesday.
“He was tremendous. He really pitched well,” Cleveland manager Terry Francona said. “We’ll take that every time. That was really fun to watch. He was fired up, as he should be.”
Gaddis will be making just the fifth start of his career and his first against the Yankees.
–Field Level Media
