Joey Gallo had not hit a home run in his last six games, but Saturday night, the streaky slugger hit two, including a two-run shot in the 10th inning off White Sox closer Liam Hendriks, and rookie Albert Abreu came in to get two outs with the bases loaded in the bottom of the inning to give the Yankees a 7-5 win at Guaranteed Rate Field.
The Yankees (64-52) evened the three-game series and go for their sixth straight series win on Sunday. The White Sox (68-49), who had walked off the win against the Yankees on Thursday, did not go down easily Saturday night.
Down to their final strike, White Sox slugger Jose Abreu crushed a home run off Chad Green to tie the game and send it into extra innings. With Zack Britton having pulled himself out of the mix to close after giving up a walk-off homer Thursday night, Aaron Boone said he would mix-and-match with Jonathan Loaisiga and Green until Aroldis Chapman is back.
He used Loaisiga in a very sticky situation to get through 1.1 innings from the sixth to the seventh. So he had to ask Green for a four-out save. It was his fourth blown save of the season. It was the 18th time this season the Yankees blew a lead in the eighth inning or later.
Boone had to go to Britton in the 10th.
He got Yoan Moncada to fly out to center before walking Brian Goodwin on four pitches. He gave up a line-drive, RBI single to Luis Robert before walking Andrew Vaughn to load the bases with one out.
Boone had to go get him at that point and turn to the rookie Abreu to get the final two outs. He got Seby Zavala to line out and Tim Anderson, who had walked it off against Britton on Thursday night, to ground into a force out for his first career big league save.
It was Gallo’s fifth multi-home run game of the season, tied for the most in the big leagues.
Aaron Judge singled with the ghost-runner on third in the 10th to score the go-ahead run. He scored on Gallo’s 28th of the season and third as a Yankee to give Britton some wiggle room in the 10th.
Judge hit a lead-off home run off Craig Kimbrel in the eighth inning to give the Yankees their third lead of the game. The Yankees slugger hit a laser 421 feet to dead centerfield on Kimbrel’s second pitch of the night. It was Judge’s eighth career go-ahead home run in the eighth inning or later and his third home run off of Kimbrel, if you include the postseason. It was also his third homer in the last two games and his third RBI of the night.
Jameson Taillon allowed three earned runs on seven hits. He walked one and struck out six over five innings. It was the first time since June 29 he allowed more than two earned runs. Joey Gallo homered, Brett Gardner tripled and DJ LeMahieu doubled twice and they each scored a run.
Loaisiga gave the Yankees 1.1 scoreless innings in the sixth and seventh, Wandy Peralta got the final out of the seventh and two in the eighth, before Aaron Boone asked Green to get a four-out save.
Gallo, who has clearly struggled since coming over to the Yankees in a deadline deal from the Rangers, hit his second home run with the Yankees in the first inning. It was his 27th home run of the season and his first in the last seven games.
LeMahieu led off with a double off Cease and scored on Judge’s sacrifice fly in the first. Gardner hit a two-out triple in the third and scored on Judge’s double.
Luis Robert hit his second homer of the season in the second. Anderson led off the game with a single and scored on Eloy Jimenez’s groundout. Cesar Hernandez singled and scored on Jose Abreu’s second double of the night to tie the game at 3-3.
The White Sox chased Taillon in the sixth inning after he gave up a lead-off single to Eloy Jimenez. That started a challenging inning for the Yankees’ bullpen. Lucas Luetge gave up a single to Yoan Moncada, who, along with Jimenez, advanced to scoring position on Brian Goodwin’s groundout. Luetge intentionally walked Luis Robert, and with pinch hitter Andrew Vaughn coming up, Boone turned to Loaisiga. The right-hander got a groundball for a forceout at home and then a long fly ball that Brett Gardner ran down and caught at the wall to end the threat.
