The New York Yankees head to Cleveland after winning the first two games of the American League Championship Series with a 6-3 over the Cleveland Guardians win last night.
Thinking in The Bronx hasn’t been clearer, this has got to be the year the Yankees make a return to the World Series. A two win home stand sees Aaron Boone’s squad two wins away from a first fall classic appearance in 15 years.
The game two win last night came with a first 2024 postseason home run for Aaron Judge and run support from the returning Anthony Rizzo to give the squad confidence ahead of their stint of games in Cleveland.
Cleveland started the game having given three runs in the first two, as Tanner Bibee could only last one and a thirds inning after working himself into two early jams. Run support in game two from Josh Naylor and Jose Ramirez wasn’t enough for any fightback.
The Bronx Bombers had taken the first game of the series 5-2 thanks to strong pitching performance from Carlos Rondon, who pitched Six innings, allowing only 3 hits, one earned run and striking out 9 and home runs from Giancarlo Stanton and Juan Soto.
But it was the other Bronx Bomber, captain Aaron Judge who delivered in game two. Judge drove in three with a sacrifice fly out in the second and a two run moon shot to centrefield just left of the bullpens in the seventh.
After the game, the Yankees captain didn’t even recognise the individual importance of that home run, only the team value, saying it was ‘good to add two more runs.’
“Just good to add two more runs there, you know against a tough team they got a great bullpen and they were fighting in claw all game.”
Judge, who is set to win his second AL MVP after a 58 home run regular season, had struggled in the postseason this year with no home runs in five and an average at .154 in the four games of the American League Division Series.
But Boone and New Yorkers will be hoping that the strong performance from Judge will kick start his postseason and lead his team to the promise land this year.
Both teams will now take the series to northern Ohio and the city of Cleveland for at least two games, three if a game five is necessary as the Guardians look to step up behind their home crowd.
