WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. — After his first taste of Major League Baseball in a steamy, windy minor league park, Aaron Judge watched as a couple of mishits ended up on the warning track.
“It’s a good place to hit,” Judge declared Friday. “Look forward to tomorrow.”
He and much of the Yankees offense seemed to enjoy the perks and quirks of a capital city in which baseballs played more like bouncy balls.
The only problem: So did the A’s.
On an afternoon in which drifting outfielders were perplexed that the balls just kept going, the no-longer-Oakland club used three home runs and a strong finish to out-offense and out-element the Yankees 11-7 in front of another sellout crowd at Sutter Health Park on Saturday.
The Yankees (22-17) wasted a multihomer game from Judge, a resounding go-ahead shot from Oswald Peraza and a spirited comeback from a four-run deficit. They led after six innings before the bullpen allowed seven runs in the seventh and eighth.
The game-changing hit in the seventh inning, which came with two on base, Fernando Cruz believed to be a fly out. He left a split-finger in the middle of the strike zone to Shea Langeliers, who appeared to get under the pitch.
Cruz scurried behind home to serve as a backup on a play at the plate for a batted ball manager Aaron Boone said “felt like kind of a fly ball to center.”
Trent Grisham drifted back. And drifted. He hit the warning track and then was nearly blindsided by the wall, bouncing off of it for what became a go-ahead, three-run home run.
“I thought it was a sacrifice fly,” said Cruz, who was charged with those three runs while recording two outs. “I was already thinking about the next hitter to get him out.”
Grisham noticed the wind picking up in the sixth inning, which led to a few outfield adventures. In the A’s four-run eighth inning, when they reached base against a wild Ian Hamilton before hitting Tyler Matzek hard, Grisham backtracked for another ball off Langeliers’ bat, which kept traveling and sailed over his glove for a two-run double.
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“Tough day out there,” Grisham said.
“Definitely hitter friendly. But everybody has to play in this park,” added Carlos Rodón, who struck out 10 in six innings but allowed four runs — all on a pair of home runs, first a mistake slider that resulted in a rocket, three-run homer to Brent Rooker and later a solo shot from Luis Urías that the wind may have helped. “There’s not many buildings around to knock down [the wind]. It’s not a big, built-up stadium. The wind plays a big factor especially during the day.
“That’s what makes the game interesting.”
If the late collapse were wind- and heat-aided, the Yankees comeback from an early 4-0 deficit might have been, too.
In the fourth, Judge stepped to the plate and heard an “Overrated!” chant from one fan (whose voice could clearly be heard, one of the oddities of playing a game in front of 12,113 fans). On the first pitch he saw from former teammate JP Sears, Judge got enough of a four-seamer for a homer that just cleared the wall in right-center.
Two innings later, Judge smacked his second of the day, this one off reliever Justin Sterner. Judge’s no-doubter bounced halfway up the batter’s eye in straightaway center for his majors-best 14th homer of the season.
In the sixth, the Yankees scored two more on sacrifice flies from Austin Wells and pinch-hitting Oswaldo Cabrera. In a tie game with Jasson Domínguez on first, Peraza got hold of a 1-2, middle-of-the-plate sweeper and pulled it just fair down the left field line for a two-run shot that put the Yankees ahead, a lead that would last one inning.
The Yankees did not blame the ballpark, and they wasted a few chances. Anthony Volpe was too aggressive in the second, trying to tag up to third base on a fly out to left that instead became a frame-ending double play. They could have done damage in the eighth inning, when they put the tying run on second and go-ahead run on first, but fireballing closer Mason Miller struck out pinch hitter Ben Rice and Paul Goldschmidt.
“Just unfortunately we couldn’t hold on,” Rodón said. “As a group we need to throw the ball better, including myself.”