The Yankees beat the Guardians 8–4 on Wednesday to finish off a sweep in Cleveland

The Yankees (41–26) beat the Guardians 8–4 on Wednesday afternoon at Progressive Field, which was previously named Jacobs Field, in Cleveland to finish off a sweep of the Guardians. The Yankees outscored Cleveland 18–11 in the three-game series. With this win on Wednesday, the Yankees have now gone 11–4 in their last 15 games.

They are now a season-high 15 games above .500. The Yankees swept their sixth series of the season. They previously swept the Royals in Kansas City in a three-game series, they swept the Orioles in a four-game series at Yankee Stadium, they swept the Red Sox in a three-game series at Fenway Park, they swept the Royals in a three-game series at Yankee Stadium from April 17 to April 19 and they swept the Giants in a three-game series in San Francisco to begin the season. The Yankees are still tied with the Tampa Bay Rays for first place in the AL East since the Rays also won on Wednesday.

The Yankees played the Guardians just last week at Yankee Stadium and in that series the Guardians won two out of three games. The Guardians outscored the Yankees 15-10 in that series. The Yankees had one win in that series by one run, which was a 2–1 win in the series finale, and the Yankees had one win in this series by one run, which was a 3–2 win in the middle game of this series in Cleveland.

The Guardians struggled in this series like they have the last two and a half weeks. The Guardians have gone 6–11 in their last 17 games from May 23 through this series with the Yankees. They went 13–3 in their previous 16 games from May 6 to May 22, which included a seven-game winning streak. The Guardians have lost four games in a row and they have allowed at least seven runs in three of those games.

Carlos Rodon got the win, which was his second win in his six starts this season. He allowed three earned runs with with four hits, three walks and seven strikeouts in six innings pitched. He threw a first pitch strike to just 11 of the 25 batters he faced. He now has a very good 3.19 ERA and a 1.19 WHIP in his six starts this season with 34 strikeouts in 31 innings pitched. Rodon has now allowed three runs or less in all six of his starts and he has allowed two runs or less in four of his six starts. Rodon allowed just one run and two hits in his start last week against Cleveland.

Rodon allowed a 406 foot solo homer to leadoff hitter Angel Martinez in the first inning. Martinez went 5–14 with two homers and five RBI against the Yankees in this series. Rodon allowed two more runs in the fourth inning. He allowed an RBI double to Austin Hedges that scored Travis Bazzana and then number nine hitter Brayan Rocchio, who is from Venezuela, had a sacrifice fly to score Spencer Fairchild. Fairchild went 0–2 with two runs and two walks in this game. Fairchild is 1–10 with five walks in his seven games this season. Rodon retired the side in order in the fifth and sixth innings and he struck out three of the last six batters he faced.

“The walks to start the inning was tough,” Rodon said. “Obviously, I want to be in the zone there. I just fell behind and gave up some free bases. I maneuvered through it a little bit and then the boys picked me up in the backend scoring a bunch of runs in the fifth, so I got a little break so I could go into the sixth. My stuff was good. The command was lacking a little bit. I want to be better and more crisp with some off speed stuff. All in all, we won the game and the boys swung the bat well and played some good defense, so it worked out.”

The score was tied at three going into the top of the sixth inning and then the Yankees scored three runs in the sixth inning, which got Rodon the win. Trent Grisham tripled with one out over a leaping Martinez in right field and then he scored when Jose Caballero, who was playing right field in this game after Spencer Jones hit a homer and played right field in the previous game, hit a sacrifice fly. Jazz Chisholm then walked, which led Red Sox manager Chad Tracy to bring in relief pitcher and Staten Island native Matt Festa and take out starting pitcher Parker Messick, who allowed four earned runs (five overall) in 5.2 innings. Messick has a dominant 2.68 ERA in his 14 starts this season. This was just the fourth time in 14 starts that he has allowed more than two runs this season.

Volpe was the first batter Festa faced and Volpe had a double to left to score Chisholm to give the Yankees a 5–3 lead. Catcher Ali Sanchez then walked and then Paul Goldschmidt had an RBI single to right to score Volpe and make the score 6–3 and give the Yankees double the amount of runs they had entering the top of the sixth. Volpe went 1–4 in this game after going 1–20 in his previous six games. Goldschmidt went 2–4 and in his eight games in the month of June he is 12-32 with two doubles, two homers and nine RBI. In his last eight games, Goldschmidt has improved his average from .261 to .287 and he has increased his OPS from .850 to .891. The 38-year-old has been very valuable this season and he has hit very well since the end of April with Giancarlo Stanton on the injured list.

In the seventh inning, the Yankees tacked on two more insurance runs off of the Cleveland bullpen. Off of Codi Heuer, who is a rare MLB player from Montana, Cody Bellinger doubled to leadoff the inning and then Grisham had a one out walk. There was then a double steal with Grisham stealing second and Bellinger stealing third. With runners on second and third and one out, Caballero singled to right to score Bellinger and then Jazz Chisholm grounded into a fielder’s choice to score Grisham to make the score 8–3.

The five through eight hitters in the lineup — Grisham, Caballero, Chisholm and Volpe — combined to go a very productive 6–16 with six RBI, two walks and seven of the eight runs scored. Caballero went 2–4 with two RBI after going 3–18 with one RBI in his previous six games. Grisham went 2–4 with three runs scored and a steal. In his eight games in June, Grisham is 12–32 with seven runs scored, two doubles, one homer and two steals. His average has gone up from .207 to .232 and his OPS has gone up from .704 to .751 in his last eight games. In Grisham’s last 15 games, he has a .377 average, eight extra base hits, 15 runs scored and a 1.021 OPS.

“A sweep is always good no matter when it comes,” Grisham said after the game. “I thought we played some really good baseball throughout the whole series and won in a few different ways. It was a good series. I think we have a bunch of really good players and it was kind of a testament this series.

The Yankees now have the most steals in the American League with 67 and the Guardians have the second most steals with 66. The Yankees have one more steal than the Guardians even though the Cleveland has played three more games than New York has played.

Will Dion, who was pitching in his fifth career game after being a ninth round draft pick by Cleveland in 2021, did not allow a run and only allowed two hits in the last 2.1 innings of the game. He has allowed just one run in his last three games in a span of 6.1 innings to lower his ERA from 9.00 to 4.35. He allowed four earned runs in his first four MLB innings.

The first three runs the Yankees scored in this game came in the second inning off of Messick. Chisholm had a triple to right that scored Grisham and Caballero and then Chisholm scored to make the score 3–1 after an error by Bazzana. Chisholm’s triple went over the head of Martinez and off of the wall in right and then Martinez fell down before throwing the ball to the infield. That allowed Chisholm to slide in safely into third. Chisholm went 1–4 with a triple and three RBI in this game and in his last two games he has four runs scored and has four RBI. In his last 22 games, he has improved his average from .200 to .232 & he has improved his OPS from .600 to .717.

Bazzana grounded out to Volpe to end the 8th inning. Caballero struck out on a 3–2 count in the 9th. Volpe grounded out to end the top of 9th.

Ryan Yarbrough threw the last two innings for the Yankees and allowed one run on a Hedges double that went more than half way up the wall in left center to center to score Fairchild, who walked to start the ninth inning. Volpe then made a good backhanded diving play going towards third and then threw to third to get Hedges out. It was ill advised by Hedges to try to advance to third. McMahon then made a great leaping catch on a Martinez line drive to end the game. Yarbrough thrives because he throws below the hitting speed and paints the corners. Hitters are geared up for mid 90s fastballs and he throws mid 80s and slower.