Yankees Dominate Orioles 9-0 Behind Schmidt’s No-Hit Bid and Power Surge

New York—The Yankees' bats exploded in a dominant 9-0 win over the Orioles. Clarke Schmidt got the starting nod for the Yankees, and Zach Eflin took the ball for the O’s. 

In the top of the first inning, Schmidt walked back-to-back hitters with one out, but he picked up his first strikeout and a pop-up to work into and out of trouble. 

Trent Grisham quickly got the scoring started with one out in the bottom of the first inning via a solo home run into the short porch in right field to make it 1-0, his 15th of the year. 

With one out in the bottom of the second inning, J.C. Escarra launched his second home run of the year to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead.

A couple of batters later, Ben Rice crushed his 13th home run of the year to extend the Yankees' lead to 3-0. 

In the top of the third inning, Schmidt retired the O’s in order and picked up his fourth strikeout of the ballgame. 

Jazz led off the bottom of the third inning with a single right back up the middle. Jasson Dominguez followed that up with a single of his own up the middle, allowing Jazz to go from first to third. The next batter, Anthony Volpe, legged out an infield single to load the bases with nobody out and snapped a 0-for-25 skid for Volpe. The next batter, Escara, came through with a sacrifice fly to make it a 4-0 game. The next batter, Oswald Peraza, dunked in a two-run bloop single just over the drawn-in infield to make it a 6-0 game. 

"I think it's all mental," Volpe said on his recent struggles. "Just making sure you're in right head space to contribute to the team because it's usually never physical or about your swing and you want to work hard and get out of stuff and to me what I want to do is do it in the cage and work really hard but I mean it really is mental." 

Schmidt picked up his fifth strikeout of the ballgame to help work a scoreless top of the fourth inning. 

In the top of the fifth inning, Schmidt worked an easy 1-2-3 inning on just nine pitches as he has kept the O’s hitless through five innings. 

Volpe led off the bottom of the fifth inning with a solo home run into the short porch in right field to extend the Yankees' lead to 7-0. A couple batters later, Escara reached via an E4 that could have been ruled a hit. Rice followed that up with an RBI triple to make it an 8- 0 game. 

Schmidt retired the O’s in order on just eight pitches in the top of the sixth inning to keep the O’s out of the hit column through six innings. 

Dominguez worked a two-out walk in the bottom of the sixth inning. Volpe followed that up with a bloop single to center, his third hit of the game. The next batter, Escara, lined a RBI single to left field to make it a 9-0 game, Escara's second hit and third RBI of the game. 

“I think just trusting the process," Escara said on his two-hit day. "Just whenever my name is called, just do anything I can to help the team win. Like I've said before, you know, I'm here for whatever the team needs. Wellsy is back there doing a great job. And I just want to mimic what he's doing back there." 

Schmidt retired the O’s in order to get through seven no-hit innings, but unfortunately, with his pitch count up to 103 on the day, that will probably be it for him, making it 25.1 straight scoreless innings for Schmidt to lower his ERA to 2.84. 

JT Brubaker made his Yankees debut in the top of the eighth inning, taking over for Schmidt and it looked like he struck out the first batter of the inning; however a missed check swing call gave Garay Sanchez another chance, and he lined a single to center field to break up the Yankees ' no-hitter. 

Clarke Schmidt's final line: seven innings pitched, no hits allowed, zero earned runs, two walks, eight wings and misses, and five strikeouts on 103 pitches, which matched a career high in pitches. Schmidt threw his cutter 44% of the time, the slider 23%, the Knuckle Curve 14%, the fastball 11%, the sweeper 5%, and the sinker 4% of the time. Schmidt has been awesome; I would have loved to see him get an opportunity to go for the no-hitter, but unfortunately, a 27-pitch first inning cost him a chance to do that. 

"Obviously, I want to go as deep as I can,” Schmidt said. “But when you're at the 103 mark and you have two more innings to go and you have 80 more games to go, you've got to think bigger picture here.”

"I kind of feel like Clarke's one of the more underrated starting pitchers in the game. It's two years now of really, really good stuff,” Yankees Manager Aaron Boone said about Schmidt. "He's deadly when he's in the zone, and he showed that today. Really proud of him, he had a great game,” catcher J.C. Escara added.

Brubaker remained in the game for the top of the ninth inning and retired the O’s in order to end this one 9-0. 

The Yankees will go for the series win tomorrow with Will Warren on the mound, facing off against Dean Kremer for the O’s. The first pitch is scheduled for 11:35 a.m. ET on the Roku network. 

My thoughts on the game: Schmidt was dominant yet again as he hasn't given up a run since June 4 over his last three starts. Four solo home runs from Volpe, Rice, Escara, and Grisham helped lead the offense. Volpe had a much-needed three-hit day, hopefully that can get him going at the plate. Grisham also had a three-hit day as he is starting to heat back up. Brubaker also looked solid in his Yankees debut, tossing two shutout innings to end this one. Escara and Rice also both had two-hit days. The offense was great all around, hopefully they saved some runs for tomorrow's series finale.