NEW YORK – The Detroit Tigers, who are fresh on four out of five wins against the American League Central leading Minnesota Twins, traveled to the Yankee Stadium in the Bronx for a test against baseball’s best team.
The New York Yankees crushed the Tigers, 13-0, in front of 42,026 fans in the first of three games. Yankees-es Gerrit Cole took a perfect game into the seventh inning and his offense blew four homeruns.
“We were all aware,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said. “Everyone is aware of it. Nobody wants to go into history on the other side of it. There was no talk of it. But the mindset is tough. Gerrit Cole is dominant.”
Despite recent improvements, the Tigers (21-31) never had a chance in Friday’s showdown as Cole cut them up and eliminated the first 20 batters he faced. The Tigers failed to put a runner on base until Jonathan Schoop’s hard hit single up the middle with two outs in the seventh.
“There’s pressure,” said Schoop, “because you think about it, and it’s in your head, but I feel no pressure (at the plate). I tried to see the ball and made a good turn, and I got a hit. . “
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Schoop drilled Cole’s first-pitch cutter to break up the perfect game.
“We faced one of the best pitchers in the match,” Schoop said. “He’s really good right now, on his ‘A’ game. He performed all his moves and got us off balance … We lost, but you do not want to get a perfect match or a no-hitter thrown at you “So you’re doing your best to break it up. Thank God I got a hit there.”
Miguel Cabrera struck a 30 meter free kick home 26 minutes into the match. 4 – 0 for the home team.
Cole, who lowered his ERA to 2.78, knocked out nine batteries and threw 73 of 102 pitches for strikes.
“It was pretty exciting,” Cole told reporters. “The fans were there. I heard them sing my name, which was pretty magical. It just means so much to us when we have them behind us. They can be such a force.”
Schoop and Cabrera were the only players to reach safely against Cole in his 11th start. Cole, a top-five finalist in the AL Cy Young poll in each of the last four seasons, did not concede a walk, despite being 3-0 behind Tucker Barnhart in the sixth.
“He was incredible,” Barnhart said. “He was able to get in front, hit the strike zone and make it really hard for us. The cutter he has, it’s a problem in a good way for him. It’s a good track. He had everything in order.”
Tiger right-hander Elvin Rodriguez showed up at Yankee Stadium for his third start and fourth career MLB appearance. The 24-year-old allowed 10 runs on 11 hits and two walks with four strikeouts and threw 88 pitches.
New York’s four home runs on Rodriguez totaled 1,599 feet.
“He’s going to have a long career,” Barnhart said of Rodriguez, who declined to speak to reporters after the match. “He’s going to pitch at Yankee Stadium quite a few more times and I’m sure he will look back on this as a growing moment in his career. His next start is great. We will do everything we can. to prepare him. ”
Cole recorded 17 swings and misses – seven fastballs, four sliders, five cutters and a changeup – to go with 17 called strikes. Tigers’ average exit speed towards him: 80 mph.
“He had complete control over pretty much every match,” Hinch said. “I’ve seen a lot of his matches and when he’s calm and under control and he’s not sweating near-accidents he’s another pitcher. He’s one of the best pitchers in the league and we saw it on our own. hand.”
In the eighth inning, Tigers position player Harold Castro took the mound for the fourth pitching appearance of his career. He came in with a 0.00 ERA across 2⅔ innings, but after two pitches, the Yankees scored a run.
“I hate using him,” Hinch said. “It’s not fair to him. It’s not even really good for the game. I would not have used him if it had been a no-hitter or perfect game to protect the integrity of the game.”
Aaron Judge got an RBI single next to Castro, finishing 4-to-5 with two RBIs. Five Yankees posted multi-hit performances – referee, DJ LeMahieu (Birmingham Brother Rice), Matt Carpenter, Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Jose Trevino – and the team logged 13 runs on 15 hits and five walks.
Tiger’s offense ended with three hits, no walks and 10 strikeouts.
The Yankees start homerfest
The Yankees scored a couple of runs by Rodriguez in the third inning on a couple of homeruns, courtesy of Trevino and the referee.
Both batsmen crushed fastballs.
Trevino teased his solo homerun on a 92.7 mph fastball, turned on the inside lane and sent the ball 405 feet to the left field. After Rodriguez pulled back the next two batteries, Judge started a solo-home run on a 94.4 mph fastball. The ball traveled 378 feet to the right field.
These homers put the Yankees ahead 2-0.
The referee has 20 homeruns in 50 matches this season. The Tigers, as a team, have 30 homeruns in 52 games, led by Schoop and Jeimer Candelario with five each.
“He’s elite,” Hinch said. “When he gets started this way, he’s impossible to pitch to, it feels like. It feels like the fence to the right field is so short for him because every ball he hits on the barrel goes 10 rows deep.
“He covers a lot of lanes. I think he’s maturing as a batsman. As a young batsman you could get up a little bit with him and find a hole, but he closes those holes. When he does, it’s high.”
Before the long balls, Rodriguez fought his way through two pointless laps. He worked around Judge’s singles in the first place and Josh Donaldson’s time in the second.
A big mistake
Willi Castro, in his seventh career appearance at the center, rushed towards the infield on a ball from Trevino with two outs in the fourth inning. After about six steps, he hit the brake and turned course toward the warning lane.
The ball was still hovering over Castro’s head, a product of his misjudgment, and instead of the Tigers finishing the inning, the Yankees and Trevino were rewarded with a two-run triple.
“He made a mistake,” Hinch said. “I’ve seen a lot of daily center players make that mistake on the turn where it looks like it’s out of the end of the bat, but it was actually outside the barrel … He just made a mistake and read it wrong. “
To finish the fourth, Aaron Hicks drilled an RBI single to the right-center gap. He tried to stretch his stroke to a double. This time, Willi Castro dropped the ball on the field in the right center and fired an excellent throw to Báez, who put the mark on second base to third out.
“He can play center,” Hinch said. “Gold Glove center players make mistakes. He just made a mistake … He made a great read on the ball to the right center, a great (read on the barehanded game and threw a ball to second place, made another great game in progress to his left. He made a mistake. He is human. “
root in the fifth round
The Yankees continued their offense in the fifth inning, scoring five more runs and chasing Rodriguez from the start. Just like in the third, the Yankees took advantage with homeruns.
Anthony Rizzo hit a three-run homer, once again on a fast ball from Rodriguez, to bring the Yankees up 8-0. Carpenter made it 10-0 with a two-run homerun – his fourth homer in seven games with New York this season – on Rodriguez’s fastball.
The Tigers replaced Rodriguez with the real reliever Jacob Barnes, who immediately filled the bases. Kiner-Falefa doubled to the right field, Trevino went and Hicks was hit by a pitch.
With the bases juicing out, LeMahieu beat first baseman Spencer Torkelson’s glove out for two runs and a 12-0 lead. Runners stood on the corners for Judge, but he grounded to a double play that ended inning.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold. Read more about the Detroit Tigers and sign up for our Tigers newsletter.
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