NEW YORK — Longtime Yankees general manager Brian Cashman has a go-to phrase when it comes to a team’s relief corps.
“Bullpens are volatile,” he says, meaning the fluctuation a group can have from one season to the next or, in some cases, from one week or month to the next.
But mostly terrific bullpens — or at least fairly decent ones in down seasons — have been a hallmark of Yankees teams the last decade-plus, and this season is shaping up as no exception.
A day after seven relievers allowed one earned run in seven innings in Friday’s season-opening 11-inning victory over the Red Sox, six arms from the bullpen threw six scoreless innings in a 4-2 victory Saturday afternoon in front of a sellout crowd of 46,882 at the Stadium.
On Friday, it was Chad Green, Clay Holmes, Miguel Castro, Jonathan Loaisiga, Wandy Peralta, Aroldis Chapman and Michael King leading the way.
On Saturday, after Luis Severino allowed two runs and five hits in three innings-plus, the phalanx of Ron Marinaccio, Castro, Lucas Luetge, Chad Green, Clay Holmes and Chapman again did the job.
After Giancarlo Stanton’s second homer in as many days — a 437-foot two-run shot in the sixth off Nick Pivetta that snapped 2-2 tie — Green and Holmes got the ball to Chapman, who overcame a two-base throwing error by shortstop Isiah Kiner-Falefa with one out in the ninth.
The bullpen has allowed two runs (one earned), five hits and six walks in 13 innings, striking out 15.
Severino, who because of various injuries had made only seven appearances (three starts) since 2019, showed flashes of his pre-injury self. His first pitch was a 96-mph fastball and his fourth came in at 98. Severino, who struck out five and did not walk a batter, topped out at 100 mph.
J.D. Martinez led off the second inning with a grounder back up the middle that Kiner-Falefa couldn’t quite handle, and Martinez was credited with a hit. Alex Verdugo, who had a standout day at the plate and in the field Friday, then turned on a 2-and-1, 98-mph fastball and sent it into the seats in right for a 2-0 Red Sox lead.
The Red Sox did not score again but drove Severino’s pitch count to 44 after the inning, much of that coming courtesy of a 12-pitch at-bat by Christian Vazquez, who hit a comebacker to end the inning.
The Yankees got their first hit with two outs in the bottom half when Joey Gallo lined a shot off the wall in right, but when he tried to stretch it into a double, he was thrown out, by a lot, by Jackie Bradley Jr.
Gleyber Torres, who began Friday’s game on the bench but pinch hit in the 10th and produced a huge sacrifice fly to tie the score, kept the deficit at two runs in the fourth. After Verdugo led off against Severino with a single, Marinaccio walked Trevor Story on four pitches. He struck out Bobby Dalbec, and when Bradley sent a ground smash up the middle, a diving Torres made a sliding backhand stop and glove flip to second to get a forceout. Marinaccio struck out Vazquez looking at a slider to end the threat.
Donaldson led off the bottom of the fourth with a single and centerfielder Kike Hernandez robbed Aaron Judge of an extra-base hit with a catch against the wall. But Anthony Rizzo, who hit a key two-run homer in the first inning Friday to turn a 3-0 deficit into a 3-2 hole, hammered a 1-and-1 fastball to right for his second two-run homer in as many days, tying it at 2-2.
Stanton’s recent mastery of the Red Sox continued in the sixth. After Judge walked and Rizzo fouled out in the sixth, Stantonr cracked his two-run homer to left-center into the bleachers above the Red Sox bullpen. He has homered in six straight games against Boston, including the wild-card game, and seven of the last eight. He and Rizzo became the first pair of Yankees teammates to homer in each of the first two games of the season.
