Goldy's 3-hit day sparks Yanks to crucial sweep in St. Louis

ST. LOUIS -- For as much as the Yankees crushed the ball all over Busch Stadium on Saturday night, the series finale against the Cardinals instead turned on a few fortuitous bounces and a return to the lineup from a revived MVP.

Cody Bellinger tied the game with a sacrifice fly in the seventh inning before putting a chopper in play to second base which St. Louis second baseman Thomas Saggese misplayed in the ninth, bringing in two runs and pushing New York to an 8-4 victory on Sunday. The win capped off New York's first regular-season sweep of the Cardinals at Busch Stadium in franchise history.

The Yankees jumped out to a 3-0 lead with a fourth-inning rally against Cardinals starter Miles Mikolas, putting them in prime position to secure their first sweep since taking three from the Mariners on July 8-10 and their first over the Cardinals since April 14-16, 2017, at Yankee Stadium.

“I thought the at-bats were, again, really good today,” manager Aaron Boone said. “Just the value of putting the ball in play there at the end, taking advantage of the mistake. Good way to finish up into an off-day.”

Making his first start of the weekend in his first return to St. Louis after six seasons as a Cardinal, Paul Goldschmidt followed up a kind tip of his helmet to a cheering crowd with three hard-hit balls, including a 110.8 mph-exit-velocity line drive to left-center which missed clearing the fence by mere inches in the fourth. That double was the first of four consecutive hits for the Yankees that inning, contributing to a three-run rally which built the lead they would eventually lose. Goldschmidt would later provide New York some insurance with an RBI double in the ninth.

“I really wasn’t worried about the knee,” said Goldschmidt, who was out of the lineup in the first two games of the series while recovering from a sprained right knee. “There’s this weird, like subconscious, when you’ve kind of hurt something or your body maybe wants to test it out a little bit. But I’d hit fine [in the cage], I’d done defense. But yeah, to get out there and play nine, it was good.”

“He got banged up a little bit, so I was happy to see him healthy and back on the field,” Mikolas said. “I know better than to throw him that pitch because he scoops that down-and-in pitch. I let that one kind of get away from me, but it's good to see him in there.”

“That’s classic Goldy right there,” Boone added. “He flashed it today.”

Under the auspices of oppressive heat, Will Warren muscled his way through 4 2/3 tough-luck innings, allowing three runs (one earned) and striking out three, but needing 95 pitches to do so. His line did improve by a degree later in the game when a ball driven to third base by Iván Herrera in the fourth inning was reversed from a base hit to an error, taking two earned runs off his tab.

“They were applying some pressure, but we were able to lean heavily on our strengths and make some good pitches to get out of it,” Warren assessed.

Catching coach Tanner Swanson was ejected in the top of the fourth inning by third-base umpire and crew chief Vic Carapazza after arguing from New York’s dugout following a Trent Grisham strikeout.

Other than Warren’s 29-pitch speed bump in the fourth and Yohel Pozo’s solo home run against Camilo Doval in the sixth, the Yankees were able to stay on the right side of the pressure ledger for the duration of Sunday’s series finale. Decamping for an off-day in Tampa before playing a two-game series against the Rays at their own Spring Training home for the first time since April 17-20, they’ll hit the ground with sustained momentum.

The weekend series win makes two in a row for the Bombers, and it’s the first time they’ve captured consecutive series since May 23-25 against the Rockies in Denver and May 26-28 visiting the Angels.

“This is a good week for us to win five out of six games, but there’s a lot of tough, tough opponents coming up,” Goldschmidt said. “We try to play well and keep going, and we definitely have a chance.”

“I think we know we’re a good team,” Boone said. “We believe that, even through some of the down times and some dark moments of the season. I don’t think we’ve ever lost that confidence. Look, we’re capable of this. We’ve got to go prove it, though.”