PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Aaron Judge sent a sweeper from Phillies All-Star Zack Wheeler deep into the left field seats, a first-inning homer that jolted scores of New York Yankees fans in No. 99 jerseys out of their seat in euphoria.
They could have stood all game — the Yankees were about to turn the game into home run derby.
Judge heard “MVP! MVP!” chants when he hit his second homer of the game in opener of a three-game series between World Series hopefuls, sending the Yankees past the Philadelphia Phillies 14-4 on Monday night.
Judge’s two homers gave him 39 on the season; Jazz Chisholm Jr. homered twice — once with Judge’s bat — and Ben Rice and Anthony Volpe all went deep.
“The guys in this room have never faltered,” Judge said. “This team took it on the chin a couple of times this year. But this team won’t get knocked down.”
Yankees manager Aaron Boone sure felt better about his team and where it might fit in the postseason when he made the lineup for Monday’s game in Philly. And why not?
Giancarlo Stanton returned to the lineup after missing 28 games with a hamstring injury, going 0 for 4 with a walk.
Chisholm made his first professional start at third base in just his second game for the Yankees.
Chisholm homered in theh second, a 99.3 mph opposite-field drive to left off Wheeler. “Let’s go, Yankees!” echoed throughout another packed house of 44,289 fans at Citizens Bank Park.
The cheers for the Yankees had just died down when Rice took Wheeler deep to right-center for a 3-0 lead.
“You see that light and you feel like you can dream what we’re capable of,” Boone said before the game. “I feel like it’s a very confident group, even through some of the dark days that we’ve been through. I feel like this is a team that has a chance to do something special. That’s still there for us.”
Only two games earlier, Boone didn’t have the luxury of writing either Chisholm or Stanton in his lineup.
An All-Star second baseman in 2022, the 26-year-old Chisholm was acquired Saturday from Miami. Chisholm took over at third from DJ LeMahieu, who dropped to a .174 average with a .483 OPS when he grounded out as a pinch hitter in the eighth.
“I feel like he has all the skills and ability to be able to handle it,” Boone said. “There may be some growing pains that we’ve got to go through there. We’ve got to live with that.”
Boone said Chisholm wasn’t necessarily the everyday third baseman.
“Guys are already starting to throw their arms around him,” Boone said. “You can tell he likes the action. We throw third base at him. Thought he was tremendous over there tonight.”
Stanton hadn’t played since straining his left hamstring while running the bases on June 22. Stanton was on the injured list for the eighth time in six years. The 34-year-old played in 69 of the Yankees’ first 79 games — none in the field — and is hitting .242 with 18 homers and 45 RBIs.
New York went 10-18 while Stanton was on the injured list for the eighth time in six years.
Boone said Stanton “knows his body” and wouldn’t rush back from injury he put “the volume, the strain that he wanted to put on himself over and over to know he’s back.
Stanton’s routine of late
“Hit, hit, hit, run, run, sit,” Boone said. “Do it again.”
Judge’s 14 first-inning home runs matched Mickey Mantle in 1961 for the Yankees’ second-most behind Babe Ruth’s 16 in 1927.
More help could be headed to the Bronx with one more day before the trade deadline.
“I look forward to getting through these next 24 hours, like, here we go boys, this is what we’ve got, let’s go get them,” Boone said.
A major league-best 49-21 through June 12, the Yankees slogged through a 5-15 stretch, and had lost four straight before winning the last two games in Boston. The Yankees are 63-45, still nipping at Baltimore for first place in the AL East.
“I feel we’re a much better roster today than we were a day ago, two days ago,” Boone said. “Getting Giancarlo back, bringing in a dynamic player like Jazz makes for a better roster and definitely more upside. We’re not a complete product yet. We’ll work hard to make sure we do the best we can with it.”
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