YANKEES 3 - NATIONALS 2
It wasn't that long ago Giancarlo Stanton was considered the prime example of Yankee ineptitude over not only the first month of the 2021 season, but of the ineptitude over the past several seasons. Stanton has the second largest contract on the team, and naturally, when a slugger of his ilk is batting .158, as he was on April 21, there is going to be a lot of anger directed from the fan base.
Well since that time, Stanton has been on fire. He has raised his batting average 140 points, went on a 12-game hitting streak, and is hitting a blistering .375 for the month of May. He even had eight hits and two huge homers this week against the Houston Astros.
Suddenly, Stanton is now a bloom in the eyes of Yankees fans everywhere.
On Sunday, Stanton was a hero once again. This time his single to shallow left with two runners aboard, drove home Travis Wade with the game winning run to beat the Nationals 3-2 at the Stadium, capping off a homestand where the Yankees went 7-2, and jumped to a season high two-games over .500 at 18-16.
A team that once had the worst record in baseball after 15 games, is now 13-6 in their last 19. Stanton is a big reason why.
In the last 13 games that Stanton has recorded a hit (including Sunday's victory) the Yankees are 9-4. Yeah, it matters when the big guy delivers, and lately, he has shown why the Yankees traded for him three years ago.
He has never received the kind of adulation that Aaron Judge or Gleyber Torres get from Yankee fans; even after a postseason where he tore the cover off the ball, hitting .308 with six homers and 23 RBI, Stanton carried his critics into this season; especially after that horrid start.
Now the critics are quiet.
On the mound, the usually erratic Domingo German pitched admirably for the Bombers; holding the Nats to just a pair of runs on five hits over 6.1 innings of work, before the bullpen kept Washington at bay until Stanton's late inning heroics.
After a day off Monday, the Yankees begin a 10-game road trip that will take them to Tampa Bay, Baltimore and Texas.
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