Sat, Jul 08, 2023 page7

• Henderson has his best night in rout of Yankees

  • AP, NEW YORK
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  Gunnar Henderson’s best night of his brief major league career sent Luis Severino to one of his worst.

  Henderson on Thursday set career highs with two homers, four hits and five RBIs — all in the first four innings — as the Baltimore Orioles routed the New York Yankees 14-1.

  “That was amazing,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said. “He’s got so much power and to be able to go opposite field the way he did in the top of the first — spraying the ball around hard, really exciting young player with a ton of tools.”

  

  Gunnar Henderson of the Baltimore Orioles, right, watches his three-run homer against the New York Yankees in their MLB game in New York on Thursday.

  Photo: Brad Penner-USA Today

  The left-handed Henderson homered to left for his first leadoff homer and singled in the second, when the Orioles’ lone scoreless inning against Severino ended with Adley Rutschman fouling off eight straight pitches before flying out to left.

  “I felt like that kept setting us up to have a pretty good offensive night — we made him throw a lot of pitches and saw him three times before the third inning,” Henderson said.

  Baltimore sent 21 batters to the plate in the third and fourth innings, opening a 13-0 lead with 11 hits, three walks and one hit batter. Henderson chased Severino with an RBI single in the third and then hit a three-run homer off Albert Abreu in the fourth.

  “Great, great team offense tonight,” Hyde said. “Loved our two-strike approach. Thought we were really grinding at the plate, battled. Ton of great at-bats, scored a ton of runs.”

  Henderson, bidding to become the fourth Orioles player this season with a five-hit game, grounded out in the fifth, struck out in the eighth and flied out in the ninth.

  “Just felt like I had a lot of at-bats in the game and the game wasn’t even halfway over,” Henderson said with a grin. “Ended up with seven on the day, so that was pretty funny.”

  Baltimore scored their most runs since a 15-10 win over the Boston Red Sox on Aug. 19 last year and had 20 hits, the highest since 21 in an 18-5 victory over Cleveland on June 6, 2021.

  Ryan O’Hearn had three hits and four RBIs, while Cedric Mullins hit a two-run double for the Orioles, who won their second straight to gain a four-game split.

  Every Baltimore starter had a hit except rookie Colton Cowser, appearing in his second major league game. The 14 runs were the most the Orioles have scored against the Yankees since a 17-9 win on Sept. 27, 2005.

  The Orioles stranded a season-high 15.

  Hyde missed the final inning-plus after he was ejected in the top of the eighth for arguing with umpires after both teams were issued warnings when Wandy Peralta plunked Jordan Westburg.

  Severino (1-4) allowed seven runs and 10 hits over 2-2/3 innings and has a 7.38 ERA with a .315 opponents’ batting average and .560 slugging percentage. He got just three swings and misses on 23 fastballs.

  “Right now they’re just hitting the ball everywhere,” Severino said. “I feel well prepared mentally. I go out there to compete and then all of a sudden, on three or four innings, I’m out of the game.”

  Severino, who entered this season 50-29 with a 3.39 ERA in parts of seven major league seasons, has given up 37 runs in his past seven games — the worst stretch for a Yankees pitcher since C.C. Sabathia gave up 39 runs in seven games from July 14 through Aug. 18, 2013.

  “I’ve never been this bad of a pitcher my whole life,” Severino said. “It’s a little tough to get my head around.”

  Kyle Bradish (5-4) allowed three hits over six innings.

  New York got their only run in the ninth inning, when first baseman Ramon Urias misplayed a two-out, two-strike grounder by Billy McKinney for an error, allowing Oswaldo Cabrera to score from third.

  “Obviously, tonight’s just a bad night for us — no fun to go through, but part of it,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “We’ve got to obviously kind of dig deep and get Sevy to where he needs to be.”

  Isiah Kiner-Falafa made his fourth pitching appearance of the season. He allowed one hit in a scoreless ninth, lowering his ERA to 2.25.

  Elsewhere, the Mets routed the Diamondbacks 9-0, the Dodgers sank the Pirates 5-2, the Guardians beat the Royals 6-1, the Cardinals blanked the Marlins 3-0, the Tigers thrashed the Athletics 9-0, the Brewers tamed the Cubs 6-5, the Red Sox defeated the Rangers 10-6 and the Mariners mastered the Astros 5-1.

  The Reds edged the Nationals 5-4 in 10 innings, the Phillies downed the Rays 3-1 in 11 innings and the Blue Jays beat the White Sox twice in a doubleheader, 6-2 in Game 1 in 11 innings and 5-4 in Game 2.

  Additional reporting by staff writer
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