Yankees get four hits from Juan Soto, solid effort from Gerrit Cole in win over Rays

After a hot start followed by a month-long swoon, the Yankees opened the so-called second half of the season Friday night looking to finish strong. They couldn’t have gotten out of those starting blocks much better.

Gerrit Cole looked like the genuine Cy Young Award-winning article in arguably his best start of the season to date, Anthony Volpe contributed a key three-run double with two outs in the third inning and Juan Soto was stellar in a four-hit performance as the Yankees rolled to a 6-1 win over Tampa Bay before a sellout crowd of 47,036 at the Stadium.

The Yankees also were perfect in the field and the bullpen gave them three scoreless innings. Talk about touching ’em all.

“It always feels good to get started on a good foot, so we wanted to come out and set the tone,” Cole said.

In his sixth start since missing the first 75 games of the season because of elbow inflammation, Cole was close to vintage form. He pitched six innings of one-run ball, allowing six hits, walking one and striking out eight. In his last two starts, he has allowed two runs, 11 hits and two walks in 12 innings, striking out 15. In his last four starts, Cole (3-1, 4.60) is 3-0 with a 2.95 ERA.

“I thought he was really great in Baltimore and more good tonight,” Aaron Boone said,

“From his bullpen through the game, that was the sharpest I’ve seen him this year,” catcher Austin Wells said. “He had everything working for him and, to be honest, he executed pretty much every pitch.”

Cole may not have been entirely economical against the Rays with his 103-pitch effort, but it was a performance worthy of an ace. And after he got called for a pitch-clock violation on the first pitch of the second inning, he managed to keep his rage in check. “I didn’t lose my composure . . . and I’m thankful [plate umpire Quinn Walcott] kept me in the game,” he said.

Volpe, who was batting .290 as recently as June 5, brought in a .245 average after going 6-for-56 (.107) in a 14-game span. His ninth-inning error on a routine grounder was costly in a brutal loss to end the first half, but his three-run double was the big blow in a four-run third Friday.

“That hit was massive,” Wells said. “It was huge for us and huge for him.”

“You play to help the team win,” Volpe said. “When you feel like you contributed, it definitely feels good.”

Soto, who was 4-for-4 with two doubles, a walk and three runs scored, leads MLB with 31 games in which he has reached base at least three times. This was his second four-hit effort of the season and his 28th multi-hit game.

Soto finished the first half with a .295 batting average and came out of this first game after the break hitting .303.

The Yankees (59-40) threatened but failed to score in their first two turns at-bat, but the third inning was a different story.

Ben Rice drew an inning-opening seven-pitch walk and Soto adroitly bunted for a base hit against an overshifted defense. Aaron Judge walked on four pitches to load the bases and Alex Verdugo hit a high-bounding ball to shortstop, picking up an RBI on the groundout.

Gleyber Torres hit a soft liner to first for the second out, but after Wells drew a six-pitch walk to again load the bases, Volpe grounded a three-run double past the dive of third baseman Jose Caballero and down the leftfield line. Wells never showed any sign of letting up as he rounded third and scored easily.

In the fourth, Soto drove a two-out double to the wall in left-centerfield and scored when the Rays made two errors on the play. Leftfielder Randy Arozarena mishandled the ball off the carom and the relay throw to third hit Soto in the back. The ball rolled into the camera well next to the Rays’ dugout and Soto was waved home.

Brandon Lowe homered off Cole in the top of the sixth, but Soto doubled off the left-centerfield wall in the bottom of the inning and scored on Judge’s single to right to give the Yankees a 6-1 lead.

Tommy Kahnle, Jake Cousins and Caleb Ferguson each pitched a scoreless inning. The bullpen has allowed two earned runs in its last 26 innings in the last seven games.

Boone on Severino

Former Yankee Luis Severino wanted to pitch against his old team when the Subway Series resumes at Yankee Stadium on Tuesday and Wednesday, but the Mets opted not to do that, choosing to use lefthanders Jose Quintana and Sean Manaea against the Yankees and give Severino nine days off between outings because of his team-high 109 2/3 innings pitched. To pitch against the Yankees, he would have had to start Friday against the Marlins, but he did not.

Severino also was lined up to face the Yankees last month, but the Mets instead had him pitch the last game before that matchup. Apparently, good-natured ribbing in a group chat with some former teammates ensued.

“They talk [expletive] about me when I ditched the Yankees. ‘Oh, you’re afraid of us,’ ” Severino said. “I said I’m not afraid. You guys right now have only two good hitters. I can walk those two guys and be fine]. But it’s always a friendly competition against the players that I played with. It’s going to be fun. Hopefully in the future I can face them.”

Severino also said, “For some reason, the Yankees are not that good against lefties this year. I mean, you only have to walk [Aaron] Judge, and after that it’ll be better. So I understand the logic of lefties because of the hitters. [Juan] Soto is a lefty. [Alex] Verdugo is a lefty. And Judge is the only big threat against lefties up there. So I understand the logic. But anyway, it would be fun to go to the Yankees and face them.”

Yankees manager Aaron Boone saw video of Severino’s remarks and was asked about them after the win over the Rays on Friday night. He replied, “Well, we’ll see where the dust settles when we’re all said and done . . . Add it all up and — we’ve taken our lumps, but I think we’re at the top of the league probably in runs scored. I saw the way [Severino] said it and was like,  'Whatever.' . . .  Hopefully we can answer him.’”

With Tim Healey

By Roger Rubin

roger.rubin@newsday.com@rogrubin

Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.