The New York Yankees opened their season in D.C. vs the former World Series Champions, the Washington Nationals.
GAME 1: 4-1 W (6 innings)
Newly acquired Yankee Gerrit Cole got the ball for the Yankees opposed by Max Scherzer of the Nationals who finished 3rd in the NL Cy Young in 2019. The bats got going early as Giancarlo Stanton crushed a 2-run home run to center field. Gerrit Cole left a fastball right down the plate to Adam Eaton in the bottom of the 1st and he crushed one to right-center field for a solo home run. Later on in the game, in the top half of the 3rd inning, Aaron Judge doubled home Tyler Wade from first base! Nothing much happened after that as the rain came in the top of the 6th which ultimately finished the game. Gerrit Cole tossed 5 innings allowing just 1 hit, the home run to Adam Eaton. Cole also struck out 5 in his Yankee debut! A very promising game from the Yankees.
GAME 2: 9-2 L
James Paxton got the ball for the Yankees as he was originally supposed to be opposed by Stephen Strasburg, but he was ultimately scratched due to nerve issues in his hand, so Erick Fedde got the ball for the Nats. In the bottom half of the first inning, Paxton allowed a triple to former Yankee Starlin Castro but was able to escape the small jam. The second inning, however, was really when the game started to get out of hand, as Paxton failed to record an out in the 2nd inning, allowing three runs. I felt that the Yankees could come back down just three, and they got two runs back, but unfortunately, those were the only runs they scored as Victor Robles and the Nationals piled on to their lead. Jonathan Holder looked good out of the pen, going an inning and a third with 2 hits allowed and 1 strikeout. Michael King I thought looked good out of the pen in place of Paxton for about an inning or so, his final line-3.1 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, 1 HR, 10.80 ERA.
GAME 3: 3-2 W
Youngster Jonathan Loaisiga took the hill for the Yankees in the third and final game of the series. Patrick Corbin who the Yankees were rumored to have interest in during the 2018-19 MLB Off-season got the ball for Washington Nationals. I thought Loaisiga looked great in his first game of the year. His pitch count was a little high for my liking, but he went 3 innings, allowed just 1 run on 2 hits, and struck out 3. After David Hale’s inning of work, the Yankees’ big boys in the bullpen came in (Adam Ottavino, Chad Green, Tommy Kahnle, and Zach Britton), and man, they were they great! They combined to go 5 innings, allowing ZERO runs on just 3 hits, and they struck out 5 including Kahnle striking out the side. On the other side of the matchup, Patrick Corbin looked like an early Cy Young favorite as he was dominating through 6.1 innings until Gleyber Torres got the Yankees on the board with his first home run of the early season (2-1 Nats). Corbin went 6.1 innings, allowing just 1 run the being the home run on 2 hits, and he struck out 8, but the Nationals bullpen came in and they did what they were accustomed to last year and that is blowing the game, Luke Voit homered off of Will Harris who replaced Corbin to tie up the game at 2. Then in the 8th inning Gleyber Torres delivered in the clutch and got an RBI single off of Sean Doolittle to score Pinch Runner at the time, Aaron Hicks. That helped the Yankees win their first series of the year, Britton was close to blowing the save but luckily Emilio Bonifacio slid off the third-base bag as Gio Urshela kept the tag on him. All in all, this was a good series win for the Yankees!
