Yankees 8, Pirates 5, and this one was pretty much decided by the time the third inning ended.
Jazz Chisholm Jr. went deep twice, drove in five, and put together the kind of night that decides a series opener almost by itself. The Yankees needed every bit of it -- Pittsburgh punched back hard enough to grab a lead in the third -- but Chisholm had the last word, and New York held on from there in front of 42,348 at the Stadium.
Jazz Answers Right Back
Here's the thing about a series opener against a team you're not exactly rivals with (the Pirates, in this case): you want to grab the lead early and dare the other side to answer. The Yankees tried. Pittsburgh answered anyway.
Chisholm opened the scoring with a three-run blast to right-center off Braxton Ashcraft in the first -- 377 feet, 106.1 mph off the bat -- and that came two batters after Paul Goldschmidt reached on a fielder's choice that turned into a two-error mess for the Pirates (Nick Gonzales botched it at third, Bryan Reynolds airmailed the relay in from left). Cody Bellinger singled in between to load things up. Sloppy start for Pittsburgh. 4-0 Yankees before some folks had found their seats.
It didn't last. Jared Triolo doubled in two runs in the top of the second, Gonzales made up for his error with an RBI single, and then Esmerlyn Valdez hit the longest ball of the night -- 436 feet, 106.6 mph -- to put the Pirates up 5-4 in the third.
That's when Chisholm decided he wasn't finished. Two batters into the bottom of the third, he turned on Braxton Ashcraft again, this one 376 feet to right field, and the Yankees were back in front 6-5. José Caballero followed with a two-run ground-rule double down the left-field line, and just like that it was 8-5. Final score, as it turned out -- nobody scored again for six innings.
Star of the Game
Chisholm's line: 2-for-4, two homers, five RBI, two runs scored. By win probability, his night alone was worth roughly 35 percentage points to the Yankees -- and that second homer, the one that erased Pittsburgh's lead, was the single biggest swing of the game by itself. (Somewhere, a Pirates advance scout is staring at that number and reaching for a drink.)
It was Chisholm's 10th career multi-homer game. He doesn't seem to mind hunting for the next one.
The Rest of the Line Score
Goldschmidt didn't have a flashy stat line -- 1-for-4 -- but he was on base for the game's first run and reached again later, the kind of quiet productivity that never makes the highlight reel. Caballero's two-run double gave the Yankees their final cushion and finished 2-for-4 himself.
Ryan Weathers didn't have his best stuff. Five earned runs in 4.2 innings, seven hits, and he left in the fifth without ever losing the lead his offense built for him -- and he still didn't get the win, because he never got through five innings. Baseball's scoring rules can be oddly strict that way. The "W" went to Angel Chivilli instead, who came on and worked 1.1 clean innings (one walk, no real trouble). Brent Headrick and Tim Hill bridged the gap after that, and Fernando Cruz closed it out with three strikeouts in 1.1 innings for his second save.
Four relievers, zero earned runs allowed between them. That's the real story of how an 8-5 lead built in three innings turned into an 8-5 final -- six innings of Pittsburgh getting nowhere after the third.
It's the Yankees' second straight win, improving them to 57-44 on the season, and this one puts them up 1-0 in the series.
Two more against the Pirates at the Stadium the rest of the week. If Chisholm's still seeing the ball like that, Pittsburgh's pitching staff should be nervous.
Jimmy writes the Bronx Pinstripes game recap after every Yankees game. Beat-reporter pacing, fan's heartbeat. He calls opposing players by last name and has no patience for dead-air innings.
