Kremer pitches Orioles past Yankees for 4-2 victory
BALTIMORE — Dean Kremer pitched seven innings of two-run ball, Adley Rutschman extended his hitting streak to a careerbest 11 games and the Baltimore Orioles defeated the New York Yankees 4-2 on Tuesday night.
Baltimore won the first two games of a four-game series between the AL East’s top teams and opened a onegame AL East lead, the largest this season for the defending division champion.
Juan Soto hit a 447-foot homer and Austin Wells also had a solo drive for the Yankees, which has lost four of six and scored just two runs in the series.
Kremer (2-2) matched his longest outing this season, allowing four hits and striking out four. While he surrendered Wells’ leadoff homer in the third and Soto’s sixth-inning drive onto Eutaw Street beyond the rightfield wall, he also induced three double-play grounders.
Jacob Webb recorded four outs including striking out Aaron Judge to end the eighth for his first big league save.
A night after going 0 for 8 with runners in scoring position, the Yankees went 0 for 1 as Judge grounded into an inning-ending forceout in the third.
Judge made his second straight start in left field — the first two of his big league career.
Baltimore did much of its damage in the fourth against Nestor Cortes (1-3) in the fourth inning. Jorge Mateo and James Mccann doubled, Colton Cowser and Gunnar Henderson followed with infield singles, and Rutschman singled in front of a diving Soto in right for a 4-1 lead. All five hits came on the first or second pitch.
Rutschman had both of his hits against Cortes and improved to 8 for 15 against the left-hander.
Cortes allowed four runs in six innings and struck out five, dropping to 0-2 in his last four starts.
Anthony Santander scored the Orioles’ first run after he doubled to lead off the second. Second baseman Gleyber Torres hit him in the back when he tried to move up on Jordan Westburg’s grounder, and Santander scampered home as the ball rolled toward the third base dugout for Torres' fourth error.
Cardinals 2, Tigers 1 (Game 1): Jack Flaherty tied an American League record with seven straight strikeouts to open a game and struck out a career-high 14 before the St. Louis Cardinals rallied against a usually reliable bullpen with a tworun ninth inning to beat the Detroit Tigers 2-1 in a doubleheader opener Tuesday.
“It’s good to steal that one,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said.
Flaherty’s game-opening seven strikeouts matched the AL record shared by Joe Cowley of the 1986 Chicago White Sox, Carlos Rodón of the 2016 White Sox, Tampa Bay’s Blake Snell in 2018 and Seattle’s Luis Castillo two years ago.
Miami Marlins right-hander Pablo López set the major league record by striking out the first nine batters of a game in 2021.