Aaron Judge’s second home run of the game as part of a three-home run barrage in the sixth inning powered the New York Yankees to a 6-2 win over the Blue Jays, dealing another blow to Toronto’s wild-card playoff hopes.
Posted Oct 01, 2021, 06:26AM EDT
Aaron Judge’s second home run of the game as part of a three-home run barrage in the sixth inning powered the New York Yankees to a 6-2 win over the Blue Jays, dealing another blow to Toronto’s wild-card playoff hopes.
Judge opened the scoring with his 38th homer of the year in the first off starter Robbie Ray.
The Blue Jays responded in the bottom half of the second as Bo Bichette scored on Corey Dickerson’s double. Toronto then took a 2-1 lead in the bottom of the fifth when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. doubled home Marcus Semien.
The Yankees then blew open the game in the sixth inning as Anthony Rizzo and Judge hit back-to-back home runs and Gleyber Torres slugged his ninth of the season with a batter on base for a 5-2 lead. That spelled the end of the night for Ray who gave up a season-high five earned runs on four hits – four of them home runs.
“They can hit. They’ve proven it all year,” Ray said “It’s a tough lineup from top to bottom. They’re a good hitting team for sure.”
The four home runs allowed matched Ray’s career-worst, set April 29, 2016 against Colorado while pitching for Arizona.
Brett Gardner added an insurance run with a solo home run in the ninth inning for New York, who have won eight of its last nine games to strengthen their grip on the first American League wild-card spot.
The good news for the Blue Jays is the Boston Red Sox lost to last-place Baltimore 6-2. The Orioles, who have lost 107 games this year, took two of three games in the series against Boston. The Red Sox are now tied with Seattle for the American League’s second wild card. Boston trails the Yankees by two games and leads the Blue Jays by one game.
Toronto opens a weekend series against the Orioles on Friday night. Steven Matz gets the start for Toronto. He is 1-1 with a 6.00 ERA in three starts against Baltimore this season.
“We’ve just got to go one game at a time and win every game now for sure,” manager Charlie Montoyo said.
