The NY Yankees, behind the pitching of Tanaka and Betances, shut out Seattle 5-0 on Wednesday afternoon. And each time, Mark Teixeira – with 404 career home runs – was the Yankee on deck.
Advertisement
Pirates 7, Astros 1: Ivan Nova took a shutout into the ninth inning and finished with a six-hitter, while Gregory Polanco hit two home runs for Pittsburgh.
“You don’t see it very often”.
“Well, you feel like he’s going to hit the ball hard, is what you feel”, Yankees manager Joe Girardi said of Sanchez.
“Our offense got shut down”, manager Scott Servais said.
“That was textbook pitching 101”, Servais said.
It was all the Yankees would need with Tanaka on the mound. The Yankees won their third straight road series.
Sanchez homered for the seventh time in eight games and Masahiro Tanaka outdueled former Japanese league teammate Hisashi Iwakuma to lift the New York Yankees to a 5-0 victory over the Seattle Mariners on Wednesday afternoon.
And yet he was overshadowed by Sanchez.
It began with Sanchez’s first swing in the first inning, a shot to left that gave the Yanks a 1-0 lead. He became the fifth player since 1913 to have nine or more home runs in his first 21 games. Trevor Story of Colorado had 10 homers in his first 21 games earlier this season.
The walks seemed nearly as impressive as the surge of home runs.
“I think there’s probably a little more weight on his game, more importance on this game for a couple different reasons”, Girardi said.
Tanaka was shaky early, escaping jams in the second and third innings before rolling the rest of the way. Buchholz (5-9) allowed one run, five hits, two walks and struck out nine in 6 1/3 innings. The walk to Seth Smith in the third-inning was the 27-year-old right-hander’s first free pass through 34 innings in August, giving him an impressive 0.8 walk percentage for the month.
“They pitched us well all series”.
Tyler Clippard got two outs in the eighth, but allowed two singles. The biggest of Seattle’s hits was a CF Leonys Martin triple in the third; he scored the Mariners’ only run on a SS Ketel Marte single.
They’ve both come a long way since their April duel, which left Tanaka saying he was “just extremely satisfied being able to get that win”.
“He hit his head on the ground; it looked like he was out of it”, McCann said.
NOTES: Mariners 3B Kyle Seager was out of the starting lineup after fouling a ball off his foot on Tuesday night.
Advertisement
New York Yankees’ Brett Gardner, right, begins his dive toward home to score as Seattle Mariners catcher Chris Iannetta waits for the throw in the seventh inning of a baseball game Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2016, in Seattle.
