The Yankees’ hitters owed Jordan Montgomery. The lefty had been steady and solid all season and did not have much to show for it. With minuscule run support, he hadn’t even earned a win in his first nine starts of 2022. Tuesday night, they paid him back, with catcher Jose Trevino leading the way with three hits in a 9-1 win over the Angels at the Stadium.
And Montgomery held it up with a season-high seven strong inning and benefitting from some really good defense, including Aaron Judge robbing Shoehei Ohtani of a home run at the center field wall, behind him.
The win snapped a two-game losing streak for the Yankees (34-15). It also gave Montgomery, who has pitched to a 3.04 ERA, his first win of the season.
Montgomery held the Angels to a run on four hits, allowing a solo shot to Luis Rengifo in the seventh. He walked a batter and struck out four. The lefty got nine swings-and-misses, four on his curveball. Montgomery threw 87 pitches, one shy of his season high.
“They really came out swinging and that kind of gave me an early lead and put together a lot of good ABs,” Montgomery said. “So a really good outing.”
Trevino went deep to left field in the eighth, after Montgomery had done his job for the night, giving the catcher a career-high tying three hits on the night. It was the sixth time he’s had a three-hit night, the last time ending with his walk-off homer against the Orioles May 24. Trevino has 12 RBI on the season
“Yeah, Jordan’s been throwing the ball well, but it was really good to give him some run support tonight,” Trevino said.
Gleyber Torres went 2-for-4 with an RBI. It was the fourth time this season Joey Gallo, hitting in the ninth spot again, had two hits and a walk. Matt Carpenter, who the Yankees signed on Thursday while they were in St. Petersburg playing the Rays, introduced himself at the Stadium with flair Tuesday. The lefty-hitting infielder took advantage of the short porch in right field with a 356-foot shot off former Met star Noah Syndergaard in the second inning.
“I knew I didn’t hit a great, but I just put a good swing on it, not a great swing and you know, it flew out,” Carpenter said with a smile. “So I can get used to that.”
Syndergaard’s first trip back to New York after six years as one of the Mets’ aces was not exactly welcoming. Without the velocity that made him a legend in Queens (his fastball topped out at 95.7 miles per hour) his stuff was flat and hittable.
Syndergaard was chased after just 2.1 innings having allowed five runs on seven hits. He walked one and did not record a strikeout. The 29-year old managed just one swing-and-miss.
He also had some help imploding with less than stellar defense behind him.
He gave up an RBI-double to Anthony Rizzo, whose fly ball got past a diving Mike Trout in right center field. Trout then slipped on Gleyber Torres’ RBI-double. Carpenter homered in his first at-bat wearing pinstripes in the Bronx for two more runs on the board.
In the second inning, DJ LeMahieu doubled in a run.
The Yankees scored two more in the sixth, one when Trevino avoided Max Stassi’s tag on LeMahieu’s fielder’s choice groundball to second base. The second run came on Judge’s sacrifice fly when Trout air mailed the throw home.
Montgomery was probably shocked when he took the mound in the second inning with four runs to work with. The left-hander had received three runs or less of support in eight of his first nine starts this season or two runs or less in seven. On average, the Yankees have scored 3.11 runs while Montgomery has been on the mound.
He also got some defensive help.
Most notably Judge, playing center field with Aaron Hicks sitting on Tuesday, robbed Ohtani in the first inning. The 6-foot-7 Judge leapt at the left-center field wall to pull back a 413-foot fly ball. He wasn’t thinking about robbing the global face of baseball, he was thinking about Montgomery.
“I was just trying to make the play, it doesn’t matter who it is. especially when we got Monty on the mound, who we haven’t scored many runs for,” Judge said. “I was just try to keep it even ball games so we can let him work a little bit.”
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