Woo Be Gone Yankees. Seattle 6 NY 3

May 22, 2024 paperbacklou 2024 0

Bryan Woo is a 23-year old, “athletic 6-foot-2 righthander with an easy, explosive delivery. His plus fastball sits 93-94 mph and touches 96 with above-average ride that helps it miss bats in the strike zone.”

That is Woo’s MLB scouting report and he looked every bit of that as he threw 6 innings of 2-hit, shutout baseball, striking out 7, to outduel Clarke Schmidt and lead Seattle to a 6-3 win at Yankee Stadium on a beautiful, warm Tuesday night in the Bronx. With a waxing moon overhead.

Gleyber Torres hit a 3-run bomb in the 7th to make it a 4-3 game, but the Yanks could not score against the backend of the Seattle bullpen of Ryne Stanek and Andres Munoz.

“It’s an elite fastball,” said manager Aaron Boone about Woo. “I thought he got it to the spots he wanted to. Had a presence with his secondary to make it work for him even more. He was tough, kind of had his way, and was real pitch efficient too; he beat us tonite.”

NY loses its 2nd in a row, having blown a win the night before against Seattle in the 9th, and are now 33-17, 1.5 games ahead of Baltimore for 1st place in the East. Seattle improves to 27-22.

1. Schmidt Good

Clarke Schmidt has been ON FIRE and he started out ON FIRE in this one — pitching a 1-2-3 inning with a strikeout in the 1st and striking out the side in the 2nd.

Schmidt was helped in the 1st by a terrific leaping catch of a line drive at 3rd by Oswaldo Cabrera.

But in the 3rd he allowed a 1-out double to 3rd baseman Josh Rojas. Schmidt went 1-2 on shortstop Dylan Moore, who then worked the count to 3-2, fouled off an 85-MPH sweeper, and then hit a 93-MPH cutter for a homer to left and a 2-0 Seattle lead. It was Moore’s 4th homer of the year.

“I thought they had a really good game plan; fouling off a lot of good pitches; a lot of deep counts,” said Schmidt afterwards. “Credit to them for having a good game plan and fouling off a lot of pitches. Kind of felt like a little bit of a marathon, but really happy to be able to make some adjustments and get through the 5th.

“What I’m most proud of is that I lost my fastball for like an inning and a half, but I was able to find it through the 4th and the 5th, getting some big ground balls and big outs with the sinker,” continued Schmidt. “In outings past if I lost my fastball I wouldn’t find it for the rest of the game.”

Seattle Stealing Signs?

Afterwards, the Yankees realized Rojas was stealing signs while on 2nd, and relaying them back to Seattle.

“When you go back and look at the video, I think they were relaying the signs a little bit at 2nd,” said Schmidt afterwards about the Moore homer. “Obviously tipping is a part of this game; it’s a factor and it’s something in the back of our heads and something we’re well aware of. The 2nd baseman (runner at 2nd) was definitely probably relaying some signs there at 2nd and obviously it paid off for them; they got 2 runs off it. But I was able to make adjustments after we saw the video; just part of the game.”

Schmidt allowed a walk in the 4th but got a double play to end the inning, and struggled a tad in the 5th, allowing a leadoff single, and then a 2-out single, before getting a groundout to end it. He left after 5 and 100 pitches thrown. His line: 5 IP, 4 hits, 2 runs, 6 K’s, 2 walks. Not bad. He loses to go 5-2 2.59.

2. Woo Better

But Bryan Woo was better than Schmidt — 6 innings of 2-hit, shutout ball, striking out 7 and walking none.

Austin Wells singled with 2 outs in the 2nd, and Alex Verdugo doubled with 2 outs in the 4th — making it to 3rd base on an error by the outfielder.

That was it for Yankee baserunners in the first 6 innings against Woo. He was as impressive as Marcus Stroman had been for the Yanks the night before. Woo wins to go 2-0 0.57 in 9 innings. It was his 2nd start of the year. Last year as a 22-year-old rookie he went 4-5 4.21.

3. Gonzalez Good; Santana Ripped; Caleb Good

Lefty Victor Gonzalez pitched a 1-2-3 shutout 6th for NY.

But Dennis Santana got ripped in the top of the 7th — allowing a Ty France homer to lead off the inning, then a double to Mitch Garver, and a 1-out single to Moore to make it 4-0 Seattle.

Caleb Ferguson came in to get the last 2 outs of the inning.

4. Gleyber 3-Run Bomb

The Yankee bats woke up against Seattle’s middle-inning relievers.

Lefty Gabe Speier came in to pitch the bottom of the 7th, and walked Aaron Judge leading off, struck out lefty Alex Verdugo, and hit lefty Anthony Rizzo with a pitch putting 2 on.

Righty Trent Thornton came in to pitch to righty Giancarlo Stanton — and got him to foul out — but with 2 out righty Gleyber Torres worked the count to 3-2, fouling off a pitch, then hit a 95-MPH four-seam fastball 392 feet to left center for a 3-run homer and 4-3 game.

5. Clayton “Who” Andrews Deflates Comeback

With the Yanks back in the game, manager Aaron Boone brought Clayton Andrews out to pitch the 8th. Who? was the question almost every Yankee fan on twitter was asking.

“Am I the only person who can watch their favorite team every freaking night and still have some middle reliever show up I never heard of?” asked baseball analyst Kelley Franco Throop on Twitter.

Andrews is a 27-year-old, 5’6 lefty had been pitching at Scranton this season for the Yanks, where he was 0-2 6.60 — allowing only 8 hits in 15 innings and striking out 18. He got the callup the day before. The Yankees acquired him from the Milwaukee Brewers in February for righthander Joshua Quezada. Andrews appeared in 4 games for the Brewers in 2023.

According to Brendan Kuty, when Andrews was called up the day before, “it was his first time ever in New York City. Wasn’t even sure if he drove over the George Washington Bridge, it was all such a blur. Found out he was getting called up at 11:15 while he was in the supermarket in Scranton. Got to the Bronx by 2:30.”

Andrew’s first pitch of the game was a 92-MPH sinker to Luke Raley, who hit it 357 feet to right for a homerun and a 5-3 Seattle lead.

You could feel the air deflate out of the Yankee balloon all over Yankee Universe.

“I hate Aaron Boone again,” tweeted baseball analyst Bullpen Betty.

“I liked the lane for him,” said manager Aaron Boone afterwards, meaning turning switch hitter Raley around to bat righty where he’s weaker. “Obviously he got ambushed there right away. The consideration is to go Fergy there, which is a fair question.”

6. Judge Gives It a Ride

Ryne Stanek came in to pitch the 8th for Seattle.

With NY down 5-3, Anthony Volpe singled to center with 1 out to extend his hitting streak to 14 games. He then stole 2nd base with Juan Soto up as the tying run at the plate. Soto grounded out sending Volpe to 3rd.

Aaron Judge was up next — another shot for the Yanks to tie the game with a homer. Judge hit a drive to deep center — but he ‘just missed’ it — it was a long fly to the warning track.

“Game.Set.Match,” said Yank fan Joe Adams on Twitter.

7. Munoz Closes Door

In the 9th, Moore hit his 2nd homer of the game — this one vs Nick Burdi to make it 6-3 Seattle.

Andres Munoz — he whose fastball averages 99 MPH with a killer slider — pitched the 9th. With 2 outs the Yanks mounted a last-ditch rally: Jose Trevino singled and Gleyber Torres walked.

But Munoz struck out Oswaldo Cabrera on 4 pitches — 89-MPH slider that Oswaldo swung and missed at, 89-MPH slider taken for a strike, 100-MPH fastball fouled off, and 89-MPH slider that Cabrera swung and missed at for the old ballgame.

The Boxscore

https://www.espn.com/mlb/boxscore/_/gameId/401569202

 

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