Jazz Chisholm Jr. hit two homers and Aaron Judge went deep again Sunday afternoon for the host New York Yankees, who continued their potent early-season ways by routing the Milwaukee Brewers 12-3 to complete a three-game sweep.
Ben Rice also homered for the Yankees, who outscored the Brewers 36-14 in the series, during which they hit 15 homers — tied with the 2006 Detroit Tigers for the most ever by a team in its first three games of a season.
The 36 runs scored are a franchise record for the first three games of a season and the third-most in major league history behind only the 1954 Chicago Cubs (41 runs) and the 1978 Brewers (40 runs).
Judge, who tied a career-high with three homers in Saturday’s 20-9 win, gave the Yankees the lead for good with a two-run homer in the first off Aaron Civale (0-1). Judge is the first player in team history with four homers in the first three games of the season.
Rice hit a solo blast in the second and Chisholm laced a two-run shot in the third before closing out the scoring with a three-run homer in the seventh. It was the sixth career two-homer game for Chisholm and his first since last July 30.
Judge scored on a wild pitch in the sixth, when Austin Wells added a run-scoring groundout. Paul Goldschmidt laced an RBI single and Cody Bellinger lofted a sacrifice fly ahead of Chisholm’s homer in the seventh.
Goldschmidt and Chisholm finished with three hits apiece while Rice and Oswaldo Cabrera each had two hits.
Tim Hill (1-0) earned the win by striking out three over 1 1/3 perfect innings in relief of starter Marcus Stroman, who gave up three runs on five hits and one walk while striking out three over 4 2/3 innings.
Sal Frelick was 2-for-4 with a first-inning RBI single and Jake Bauers hit a two-run homer in the fourth for the Brewers, who are 0-3 for the first time since they opened 0-4 in 2015. Bauers also threw a scoreless eighth inning for the second straight game.
Civale allowed five runs on four hits and one walk while striking out two over three innings. Civale sustained a left hamstring injury in the third and exited after throwing 68 pitches, 44 for strikes.
“We are being smart about it and getting some more information in the next few days,” Civale said. “We’ll take care of it as best as we can, and we’ll go from there.”
–Field Level Media