The New York Yankees defeated the Cleveland Indians 12-3 on Tuesday night.
It was a brutal showing for Shane Bieber, who was systematically dismantled to the tune of seven runs over the course of 4.2 innings.
After the game, Judge had a blunt response to his squad’s performance.
“We got mistakes and we didn’t miss them,” he said.
“Those mistakes, you got to do damage on them.”
How bad did things get for Cleveland? Well, even Giancarlo Stanton, who couldn’t hit his way out of a paper bag to start the outing, eventually walked away with a 443-foot bomb in the ninth.
What a difference a little cheating makes. https://t.co/xgcc9A45Qh
— Game 7 (@game7__) September 29, 2020
“It seemed to me he was a little too excited,” Sandy Alomar said of Bieber after the game.
“This was his first postseason games. His fastball was coming back to the zone a little bit elevated. The one to Judge was elevated.
“I expected the Yankees to have a good approach and good at-bats. The breaking ball that Shane had tonight helped them. He wasn’t throwing it in the zone and they were able to eliminate that pitch. Hey, he’s a young guy, the best pitcher in the American League this year, and he had a bad game.”
It was about as demoralizing a start to the Wild Card round as the Indians could have had.
“We have come back from games like this during the regular season,” he continued.
“We’ve come back after getting our butts kicked ready to roll. The guys understand the situation. Tomorrow is a different day and we start back from zero again.”
Bieber, for his part, didn’t make excuses.
“That first inning didn’t go as planned,” he admitted.
“Objectively, I just wasn’t as aggressive as I wish I would have been with my off-speed stuff in the zone and maybe the fastball in so I could challenge these guys a little more. I fell behind and forced myself into some bad situations.”
Not surprising. https://t.co/WLcM4GhrSH
— Game 7 (@game7__) September 28, 2020
All in all, it quickly became apparent why New York came into this thing as the American League leader in runs and OPS.
The Indians will look to bounce back on Wednesday when Carlos Carrasco steps up to the mound. He will work opposite Masahiro Tanaka.
Alomar obviously hopes that Tanaka will provide his team with more opportunities than $324 million dollar man Gerrit Cole did.
“We had like five hard-hit balls in the first and second time around, but he managed to control the zone,” Alomar said.
“He’s a veteran, seasoned guy. He went to work after that, started mixing more pitches. He kind of attacked the guys.
NBA ratings and NFL ratings have one thing in common. https://t.co/bxZOa6b5LE
— Game 7 (@game7__) September 29, 2020
“He’s going to give you stuff to hit, but you better take advantage of it. We got traffic at times, but we didn’t take advantage of it.”
Will Cleveland be able to take advantage of Tanaka in a way they couldn’t Cole? They better hope so – otherwise their season will end much sooner than planned.
Game 2 between the Yankees and Indians will start at 4:08 pm PT and air on ESPN.
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A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
