Yankees cruise past Royals 7-0 to complete sweep after rain delay
- Davis Cornell
- Apr 19
- 3 min read
After nearly a three-hour rain delay in the Bronx, the Yankees dominated the Royals 7-0 to complete the three-game sweep. Ryan Weathers got the start for the Yankees and faced off against Cole Ragans.
Weathers navigated around a one-out single from Bobby Witt Jr. in the top of the first to put together a scoreless frame.
The Yankees wasted no time getting the scoring started. Ben Rice worked a leadoff walk, Aaron Judge followed with a two-run bomb, his ninth homer of the year, giving the Yankees a 2-0 lead. Cody Bellinger, Trent Grisham and Amed Rosario all worked walks to load the bases with one out. Austin Wells made it a 3-0 ballgame thanks to a sacrifice fly.
"It's so contagious, I mean, especially when he's the guy to do it," Rice on Judges homer getting the offense going. "Just gets everybody going, gets everybody ready to go, and it's a lot of fun to watch it fly out of the ballpark when he hits it."
Rice crushed a solo home run into the short porch in right, his fourth consecutive game with a home run and three of those being against lefties, now eight homers on the season.
"I feel like in a good spot, feeling good," Rice said. "And I just got to keep getting good pitches to hit, and hopefully capitalize on them."
In the top of the fourth, Weathers struck out the side in order, making it four strikeouts in a row.
Belli dunked a leadoff double into left to lead off the bottom of the fifth. Paul Goldschmidt then worked a walk. Grisham then crushed a three-run home run into the second deck, his third of the year to make it a 7-0 game.
It looked like the Royals were going to crack the score column in the top of the sixth, but Grisham and José Caballero teamed up for a perfect relay to gun down the runner at the plate.
Weathers worked around a pair of two-out singles in the seventh, racking up two more strikeouts to bring his total to eight and finish another scoreless frame.
Weathers came back out for the top of the eighth and picked up the first out. Angel Chivilli took over for him and picked up the final two outs of the frame.
Final line for Weathers: 7.1 shutout innings, surrendering five hits, walking one, and striking out eight on 95 pitches, lowering his ERA to 3.21. Weathers threw his fastball 31% of the time, the sweeper 29%, the changeup 23%, the sinker 14%, and the slider 3%. Weathers fastball topped out at 97.5, averaged 94.9 mph, and had 13 swings and misses on the day.
"Just relaxing instead of trying to hit a spot, just letting my arm free flow and just get through the pitch," Weathers said on what he has changed in between starts.
Chivilli remained in the game for the top of the ninth inning and recorded the final three outs of the ballgame to help the Yankees complete the sweep.
The Yankees will begin a nine-game road trip on Tuesday with three games in Boston, three in Houston and three in Arlington. 18 of the Yankees' next 25 games will be on the road. Luis Gil will get the start for the Yankees; the Red Sox starter is still TBD. First pitch is slated for 6:45 p.m. ET on the YES Network.
"Those are always fun series," Rice said. "We're looking forward to heading over to Fenway."
My thoughts on the game: Great game and just a great series all around from the Yankees. After playing so many tight games early on in the season, the Yankees desperately needed a couple of blowout wins to give the bullpen some much-needed rest. Weathers was dominant today, giving the majority of the bullpen the day off. The offense was awesome today, as Judge, Rice and Grisham all went deep. Rice’s at-bats are turning into must-see TV as he leads the MLB in OBP at .476, Slugging percentage at .800, and OPS with a 1.276. The thing that stands out to me the most about Rice is that he is dominating left-handed pitching this year with a 1.322 OPS. Rice also has a top-10 wRC+ in the MLB since the start of last year. Caballero has also been on fire this week at the plate, hitting .381, with three extra base hits, four RBIs, a 1.054 OPS, and four stolen bases. On to Tuesday, as the Yankees will look to extend their win streak to four straight.
"Just on both sides doing a really good job, and then obviously what he brings to the table on the bases," Aaron Boone said of Caballero.
Comments