NEW YORK (AP) — Aaron Judge started another home run barrage with a three-run, first-inning drive that made him the third-fastest Yankees player with 500 extra-base hits and finished with three hits and four RBIs to lead New York over the Arizona Diamondbacks 9-7 Thursday night.
New York’s Trent Grisham and Jazz Chisholm Jr. added two-run homers off Merrill Kelly (1-1), who allowed a career-high nine runs, nine hits and three walks in 3 2/3 innings. The Yankees had 22 homers on a 4-2 opening homestand, five more than any other team hit in its first six games.
Judge fell a triple short of the cycle and is hitting .417 with five homers and 15 RBIs. He has 320 homers, 175 doubles and five triples in 999 games, and only Joe DiMaggio (853) and Lou Gehrig (869) reached 500 extra-base hits in fewer games among Yankees.
Carlos Carrasco (1-0) got his first Yankees win, giving up three runs and five hits in 5 1/3 innings. On a night with a 71-degree temperature, up from 42 on Wednesday, he started 17 of 22 batters with strikes.
RED SOX 8, ORIOLES 4
BALTIMORE (AP) — Alex Bregman, Kristian Campbell and Triston Casas all hit two-run homers, and Boston beat Baltimore to take two of three in the series.
Cedric Mullins led off the bottom of the first with a home run for Baltimore, but Charlie Morton (0-2) allowed five runs in five innings in his home debut for the Orioles. Morton struck out 10, but the two home runs he yielded each followed a walk.
Bregman went deep in the first for his first RBIs of the season. Then Campbell, who signed a $60 million, eight-year deal before Wednesday’s game, hit his home run in the second to make it 4-1.
Casas’ drive made it 7-3 in the seventh. He was 2 for 21 with no RBIs entering the day.
All three home runs were hit to left field, where the Orioles moved the wall in from last season. Bregman’s shot reached the seats, meaning it would have been out in 2024, too, but the other two did not.
Red Sox starter Tanner Houck allowed three runs in four-plus innings. Zack Kelly (1-0) got the win in relief.
PHILLIES 3, ROCKIES 1
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Taijuan Walker pitched six scoreless innings, Kyle Schwarber homered and Philadelphia defeated Colorado.
Walker, who was pulled from the Phillies rotation in 2024 because of his ineffectiveness, was making his season debut as a starter filling in for the injured Ranger Suárez. He allowed three hits and struck out four.
After striking out Hunter Goodman for the final out of the sixth inning, Walker received a standing ovation from the Philadelphia crowd — the same fans that booed him during introductions.
The win capped of a three-game sweep of the Rockies for Philadelphia.
Bryce Harper had an RBI double off Antonio Senzatela — one of 10 hits yielded by the Rockies starter, however it was the only run he allowed in 5 1/3 innings.
ASTROS 5, TWINS 2
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Christian Walker and Jeremy Peña homered and Brendan Rodgers had three hits and three RBIs to lead Houston to a win over Minnesota.
Hunter Brown (2-0) gave up two runs in the first and shut down the Twins the rest of the way, allowing five hits and no walks with eight strikeouts in six innings. The 26-year-old righty retired 15 of the last 16 batters he faced.
Bryan King, Bryan Abreu and Josh Hader pitched scoreless innings in relief. Hader earned his third save.
Twins starter Joe Ryan (0-2) allowed five runs on five hits and struck out six over five innings.
Minnesota took a 2-0 lead in the first inning of its home opener. Matt Wallner led off with drive to the warning track that got stuck under the padding on the wall in right-center. He reached third base on the play, then scored on Carlos Correa’s groundout. Byron Buxton followed with an infield single. He stole second and scored on Trevor Larnach’s line-drive single to left-center.
The Astros got those runs back when Walker and Peña started the second with back-to-back homers.
Rodgers put the Astros on top for good with a two-run single in the fourth and drove in Victor Caratini with a double in the sixth to make it 5-2.
BREWERS 1, REDS 0
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Nestor Cortes bounced back from his dreadful Milwaukee debut by allowing just one hit over six innings in a victory over slumping Cincinnati.
The Reds lost 1-0 for a third straight game after falling by that score to the Texas Rangers each of the previous two days. According to Sportradar, the Reds are the first team to lose three consecutive games 1-0 since the Philadelphia Phillies in May 1960. It’s happened six times in the majors, four of those from 1908-17.
Cortes (1-1) was pitching five nights after allowing homers on each of his first three pitches in a 20-9 loss to the New York Yankees, his former team. Cortes yielded eight runs, five walks and six hits in two innings of a game that helped draw attention to the Yankees’ use of “torpedo bats.”
He was much sharper Thursday, striking out six and walking two. The Reds’ only hit off Cortes was a one-out double by Jose Trevino in the third.
Joel Payamps retired the side in order in the ninth for his first save.
Cincinnati’s Nick Lodolo (1-1) allowed one unearned run and four hits in 6 2/3 innings.
The Associated Press
