Juan Soto hit his first home run of the postseason, and Carlos Rodón rebounded with nine strikeouts in six strong innings as the New York Yankees defeated the Cleveland Guardians 5-2 in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series (ALCS) on Monday night.
Playing in front of a sold-out crowd of 47,264 at Yankee Stadium, Soto launched a solo shot off Guardians pitcher Alex Cobb to kick off a three-run rally for New York in the bottom of the third.
After the blast, Cobb – making his first postseason start since 2013 – managed to get two outs but walked Yankees sluggers Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Anthony Volpe before being pulled from the game.
With the bases loaded and sitting on two outs, Guardians manager Stephen Vogt turned to rookie reliever Joey Cantillo, who struggled with his command. Cantillo threw an AL postseason record four wild pitches, two of which allowed runs to score to hand the Yankees a 3-0 advantage.
“That’s what good teams do,” Soto said about the team’s pivotal third inning. “It’s not about one guy, it’s about the whole lineup and we showed, we put pressure on those guys.
“Taking pitches and getting our walks, getting guys over, bases loaded, making those guys make wild pitches and everything. At the end of the day, it’s a team effort and we showed up today.”
On the mound, Rodón bounced back from a tough AL Division Series outing with a dominant performance for the first postseason victory of his career.
He retired 11 straight Guardians players at one point, ultimately finishing with nine Ks over six innings, allowing just one run on Brayan Rocchio’s solo homer in the sixth. Rodon’s start was crucial, retiring 13 of the final 15 batters he faced.
In Game 2 of the ALDS series against the Kansas City Royals earlier this postseason, Rodón got off to a dominant start but unraveled in the fourth inning, allowing four runs before being pulled.
“I had it under control most of the night,” Rodón said Monday about keeping his emotions in check. “A couple days ago, I watched Gerrit (Cole) throw that Game 4 in Kansas City, and mentally, I was taking notes on how he was going out there and going about it, and I just wanted to kind of go about it the same way and I thought I did well with that tonight.”
Stanton added to New York’s cushion in the seventh inning with a solo shot to left field, extending the Yankees’ lead to 5-1.
Cleveland threatened to make it a game in the top of the eighth, hitting three consecutive singles off Yankees reliever Tim Hill. Guardians outfielder Steven Kwan’s grounder to left field brought in a run to cut the deficit to 5-2, but that was as close as Cleveland would get.
With the tying run at the plate, Yankees manager Aaron Boone turned to closer Luke Weaver for the last five outs. Weaver struck out pinch hitter Will Brennan and got Guardians superstar third baseman José Ramírez to ground out, ending the threat.
After allowing a walk in the top of ninth inning, Weaver struck out the next three batters, securing his fourth save of the postseason and the Yankees victory.
Game 2 of the series is set for Tuesday at Yankee Stadium: Cleveland will send ace Tanner Bibee to the mound to try to even the series, while the Yankees will counter with star pitcher Gerrit Cole.
Historically, since the ALCS became a best-of-seven format, teams that win Game 1 have gone on to win the series 23 out of 38 times (about 60.5%), including 10 of the last 13 (nearly 77%).