By Kaitlyn McGrath, Rustin Dodd, Brendan Kuty and Chris Kirschner
NEW YORK – This wasn’t your typical October classic. There were five lead changes between the New York Yankees and Kansas City Royals in Game 1 of the ALDS on Saturday, a postseason first. Neither starter was much of a factor, bullpen decisions backfired, ill-advised sends were made and a controversial replay review proved pivotal.
In the end, it was Yankees left fielder Alex Verdugo, an unlikely hero, who drove in the winning run as the Yankees topped the Royals 6-5, sending the 48,790 sellout crowd at Yankee Stadium home happy.
After the Royals took a 1-0 lead in the second, Yankees second baseman Gleyber Torres hit a go-ahead, two-run home run off Royals starter Michael Wacha in the bottom of the third inning to put New York up 2-1.
The Royals didn’t trail long, though, after left fielder MJ Melendez replied in the fourth with a two-run home run off Yankees starter Gerrit Cole, who wasn’t his ace-like self, finishing with four runs on seven hits with two walks and four strikeouts.
In the fifth, the Yankees capitalized on Kansas City’s wild pitching, using four walks – including two with the bases loaded — to pull ahead 4-3. But the Yankees handed the lead right back after shortstop Anthony Volpe made a costly error in the sixth, throwing away a potential double-play ball before Royals pinch-hitter Garrett Hampson knocked a two-RBI single up the middle.
After the Yankees tied it 5-5 in the bottom of the sixth off an Austin Wells run-scoring single, they would take a decisive lead in the seventh inning. Third baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. led off the inning with a single, then stole second base. After a replay review ruled Chisholm safe, despite camera views that suggested otherwise, he would come around to score the winning run on a Verdugo single to left field.
Game 2 of the series resumes on Monday at 7:38 p.m. ET at Yankee Stadium. The Royals will try to bounce back with Cole Ragans on the mound, while the Yankees will counter with Carlos Rodón. -Kaitlyn McGrath
Verdugo comes up clutch
Revenge? Redemption? Renewal?
For Alex Verdugo, Game 1 was all that.
Verdugo went from being the only Yankees player to be booed during pregame introductions to having the biggest night out of anyone. His seventh-inning single provided the go-ahead run and capped off a night in which he went 2-for-3 with a walk and made two impressive plays in left field.
Alex Verdugo RBI single!@Yankees lead! #Postseason pic.twitter.com/bxfPQOlQt4
— MLB (@MLB) October 6, 2024
In the seventh, Verdugo laced a line-drive single with two outs to score Jazz Chisholm Jr. from second base and to snap a 5-5 tie. It came off reliever Michael Lorenzen, and during the pitching change that came after the clutch hit, Verdugo was mobbed in the dugout by his teammates.
It had to have been cathartic for Verdugo, who had a down season at the plate, posting a career-low 83 OPS+. Before the game, it seemed likely the Yankees would start Jasson Domínguez over Verdugo. Domínguez, their top prospect, had been given the final five starts of the season in left field in what appeared to be a crash course for the playoffs.
Instead, the Yankees gave the start to Verdugo, opting for his eight years of MLB experience and superior glove, which he flashed making an impressive sliding catch at the left-field line to end the fourth inning.
Boone said it was a “fairly” easy call when he put Verdugo in the lineup over Domínguez. It was also the right decision. — Kuty
What did the MLB replay officials not see?
There will be plenty of questions about MLB’s replay process after a close — and controversial — call in the bottom of the seventh.
The Yankees’ Jazz Chisholm Jr. singled with nobody out and then tried to steal second as Anthony Volpe went down swinging. Salvador Perez threw high to second and Chisholm was called safe. But the Royals challenged the call, and replays appeared to show that Chisholm came up short on his slide while Bobby Witt Jr. applied the tag with Chisholm’s foot just centimeters from the side of the bag.
While some angles were more inconclusive, one angle in particular seemed to show daylight between foot and bag while the tag was applied. But it wasn’t enough for the replay officials to overturn the call.
The call then took on significant meaning when Alex Verdugo lined an RBI single into left field, giving the Yankees a 6-5 lead. — Dodd
Cole doesn’t deliver an ace-like performance
A day before Gerrit Cole took the mound for the Yankees in Game 1, his manager, Aaron Boone, said he felt the Yankees ace came into the postseason looking the best he had all year. He was right. Even including the dud against Boston in which Cole intentionally walked Rafael Devers and then unraveled from there, he pitched to a 2.53 ERA in September.
But Cole did not look like the 2023 American League Cy Young-winning version of himself Saturday night. The Royals chased Cole in the fifth inning, leaving him with seven hits allowed, two walks, a home run, three earned runs and just four strikeouts. Cole registered only six swings and misses against the Royals’ lineup, which finished the regular season with the third-best strikeout percentage.
Cole’s outing started ominously. He pitched a 1-2-3 first inning, but the Royals put three balls into play with exit velocities over 100 mph. The Royals finished with 11 hard-hit balls against him. He and the Yankees were lucky to not let the damage grow into more runs. In the second inning, Juan Soto threw out Royals catcher Salvador Pérez at home plate on an MJ Melendez single. Kansas City would have had bases loaded and no outs if Pérez had stayed at third.
Kansas City’s plan coming into the night was obvious. They were sitting fastball. Melendez pulled a fastball into the short porch for a 2-run home run in the fourth inning. By the end of the night, Cole had just two swings and misses on his signature pitch.
Cole is projected to start a potential Game 4. He’ll have to adjust to have better success against this Royals lineup. — Kirschner
Did Quatraro pull Wacha too early?
Royals manager Matt Quatraro pushed all the right buttons in a two-game sweep of the Baltimore Orioles in the Wild Card Series. But his decision to pull starter Michael Wacha with the Royals leading 3-2 and nobody out in the fifth inning did not go as planned.
Wacha was facing the Yankees’ lineup a third time when he issued a leadoff walk to Gleyber Torres — a plate appearance that included a 2-2 sinker on the corner that was called a ball. Rather than let Wacha face lefty Juan Soto a third time, he called upon reliever Angel Zerpa, a hero on Wednesday in Game 2 against the Orioles.
Zerpa had worked 8 ⅔ scoreless innings with 10 strikeouts in his last nine appearances, including a bases-loaded jam in Baltimore in Game 2, when he recorded two outs after replacing starter Seth Lugo.
It was understandable that Quatraro was hesitant to let Wacha face Soto a third time, though Aaron Judge was up next and Wacha had continued to be Judge’s Kryponite on Saturday. Wacha struck out Judge in the first before getting him to fly out in the third.
Should Quatraro have rolled the dice against Soto and let Wacha face Judge one more time? Wacha was at just 70 pitches but had issued three walks while striking out three.
In any case, it quickly went awry.
Zerpa allowed a single to Soto and then walked Judge and Austin Wells on a count that went 3-2, forcing home the tying run. Quatraro then turned to John Schreiber with the bases loaded and nobody out. Schreiber got two outs before issuing another bases-loaded walk, allowing New York to take a 4-3 lead. But he gamely limited the damage by getting Oswaldo Cabrera to look at a 93 mph sinker for strike three. – Dodd
(Top photo of Alex Verdugo: Elsa/Getty Images)