Yankees' Giancarlo Stanton hits grand slam in win over Blue Jays
Yankees designated hitter Giancarlo Stanton and Juan Soto celebrate after Stanton’s grand slam against the Blue Jays during the third inning of an MLB game at Yankee Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
The Yankees’ series-taking 8-3 victory over the Blue Jays at Yankee Stadium on Sunday was forged by one huge moment and many smaller ones.
The huge moment came from Giancarlo Stanton, who crushed a 417-foot grand slam off the facing of the second deck in leftfield in the third inning to give the Yankees a 5-1 lead.
From there, the smaller moments consisted of manager Aaron Boone trying to squeeze six innings out of starter Luis Gil and his bullpen to hold that lead until the Blue Jays ran out of outs.
Gil went 4 1/3 innings before a high pitch count (95) ended his second start of the season.
Winning pitcher Jake Cousins got three outs and overcame two walks to allow only an unearned run. Nick Burdi hit a batter but got two big outs as the Blue Jays moved to within 5-3 in the sixth. Caleb Ferguson and Dennis Santana shared the seventh and eighth, and Santana stayed on for the ninth and set the Blue Jays down in order to earn his second career save.
“They’ve come up big,” Stanton said. “They’ve given us a chance to win every game. That’s all you can ask for.”
Cousins, a cousin of NFL quarterback Kirk Cousins (say that 10 times fast), joined the Yankees on April 1. Santana, who pitched in nine games for the Mets last season, joined the Yankees on Friday. He threw 37 pitches that day.
“I really wanted to stay away from Santana, actually, and he goes out and gives us just a gutsy [performance],” Boone said. “That was big on him to finish that game there for us.”
Stanton’s two-out slam was his second homer in two days and third of the season. Unlike his 349-foot home run to right on Saturday night, this Stanton bomb did not require a video review. Everyone in the building knew it was gone from the moment it left his bat at 110.6 mph.
Stanton, who had fallen behind 0-and-2 to begin the at-bat, took a few steps toward first and then flung his bat in the direction of the jubilant Yankees dugout.
“That was a jolt,” Boone said. “One of those you know right away. I know I reacted to it.”
Then it was left to see how long Gil could last. The righthander needed 30 pitches to get through the third inning, when he walked in a run to put the Yankees in a 1-0 hole.
Gil was bothered during that long inning by some ball calls from noted (and not for his excellence) umpire Angel Hernandez. Even though the calls seemed accurate, Gil at one point crouched in disbelief after a walk, which is not a good idea for a youngster with any veteran umpire.
Said Boone: “I thought he was missing a little bit and I felt like that got the best of him a little bit out there emotionally. I just wanted him to focus on execution, like, ‘Don’t get caught up in that. You can’t get reactive or emotional that a call doesn’t go your way.’ ”
Gil struck out the side in the fourth, an inning that was blemished only by a one-out walk.
In the fifth, Gil allowed a one-out double by Vladimir Guerrero Jr., after which Boone called on Cousins to begin the parade of Yankees relievers.
Bo Bichette doubled home Guerrero to make it 5-2 and close the book on Gil, who was charged with two runs. He allowed two hits, walked four, hit a batter and struck out eight.
Gil flashed the overpowering stuff that earned him the fifth starter’s spot out of spring training — reaching as high as 100 mph with his fastball — but threw 54 strikes and 41 balls. Not the ratio you want, but much better when you consider it was 34 to 33 after the third.
The Yankees made it 6-3 in the sixth on a run-scoring groundout by Gleyber Torres.
Ferguson was the next Yankees pitcher. He allowed a leadoff single in the seventh, retired the next three batters, and started the eighth by getting an out on a spectacular sliding/pop-up-and-throw-from-behind-second-base play by Anthony Volpe.
Santana was next (coming in from the bullpen to the strains of Carlos Santana’s “Smooth”). He was smooth in his second Yankees appearance, getting two groundouts on three pitches to send the game to the bottom of the eighth.
Volpe (3-for-4, two stolen bases, batting .424 with a 1.092 OPS) led off with a single, stole second and third and scored on a single by Oswaldo Cabrera. Juan Soto’s sacrifice fly later in the inning made it 8-3.
Closer Clay Holmes, who had been up in the bullpen, sat down. The Yankees had gotten enough runs and enough outs.
They have won every game in which they have scored and are 8-2.
“We’ve been able to win games in different ways,” Boone said. “In a lot of ways, I don’t feel like we are totally clicking offensively yet. We’re doing what we need to do.”
Anthony Rieber covers baseball, as well as the NFL, NBA and NHL. He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since July 5, 2004.
