The Yankees kicked off a weekend series with the San Diego Padres on Friday, and soon put ace Yu Darvish on notice. It wasn’t from Aaron Judge’s sacrifice fly in the first inning either.
Rather, the Yankees made their presence known with two outs in the third inning. After Anthony Volpe’s sacrifice bunt moved Austin Wells to second, Juan Soto started the party with a two-run blast, his 14th of the season.
Aaron Judge then followed with a solo home run for his 16th of the year. Alex Verdugo just missed a third consecutive home run when his shot to left grazed the top of the wall, and Giancarlo Stanton answered with a two-run shot.