Paul Goldschmidt finds power stroke for Yanks, who face Rays

For most of his first weeks with the New York Yankees, longtime slugger Paul Goldschmidt maintained one of the highest averages in baseball despite a notable lack of power.

Goldschmidt has homered in two straight games, however, going into New York’s Saturday afternoon home game against the struggling Tampa Bay Rays.

The Yankees opened the series with a 3-0 victory on Friday, getting big nights from Aaron Judge and Goldschmidt, who hold the top two averages in the majors at .430 and .361, respectively. Judge extended his on-base streak to 28 games with a double and a triple, and he lifted his average three points. Goldschmidt’s two hits raised his average five points.

One of those hits was Goldschmidt’s third homer and second in as many games after he hadn’t gone deep since March 29, the second game of the season. He provided all of the Yankees’ runs on Friday by hitting an 0-1 fastball into the right field seats for a three-run homer in the fifth inning, two batters after Judge doubled.

“I don’t think anything about it,” Goldschmidt said of his high average after batting a career-low .245 last season with the St. Louis Cardinals.

“I’d love to get a hit every time. “I’d love to hit as high an average, as many homers, as many wins as we can, but there’s going to be ups and downs. For me, a big part is really just not paying attention to it and just showing up and trying to put the work in and be prepared to help us win every day.”

Goldschmidt has reached safely in 25 of 32 games this season, and his homer gave him his 15th multi-hit game of the campaign. He is hitting .448 (13-for-29) with runners in scoring position.

“To me, it looks like he’s taking great at-bats and he’s trying not to waste anything,” said Yankees left-hander Max Fried, who surrendered just one hit and two walks in seven scoreless innings on Friday.

The Rays have lost four straight games, their third skid of at least that many games this season.

The swoon follows a five-game winning streak in which they scored 23 runs against the Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres. On Friday, Tampa Bay was blanked for the second time in three games and has scored three runs in its skid.

“A lot of frustration, and I get it, because we’re all confident we’re better than we’ve performed the last four or five games,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said.

Jose Caballero had the Rays’ only hit on Friday, and the Rays had just one at-bat with a runner in scoring position. They lost for the fourth time in five games against the Yankees this season.

Right-hander Clarke Schmidt (0-1, 5.52 ERA), who is coming off the best of his three outings since a shoulder injury delayed the start of his season, will start for the Yankees on Saturday. Schmidt took a no-decision Sunday when he allowed one run and one hit in five innings against the Toronto Blue Jays. He walked four and struck out six.

Schmidt is 2-3 with a 3.06 ERA in 10 appearances (six starts) against the Rays. He last opposed them on May 10, 2024, when he allowed five hits in 6 2/3 scoreless innings to earn a win.

Fellow righty Zack Littell (1-5, 5.03 ERA), who is coming off his first win, goes for the Rays. Littell surrendered two runs on five hits in five innings Sunday at San Diego after allowing 17 runs in 29 innings during his five-game losing streak.

Littell is 2-1 with a 5.71 ERA in three career starts against the Yankees. In his last start against them on July 22, 2024, in New York, Littell was tagged for five runs on nine hits and two walks in 5 2/3 innings.

–Field Level Media