Former Ace Luis Severino Steps Up To Right The Ship For The Yankees

Five innings of shutout baseball, two walks, and six punch outs for the Yankees former ace, Luis Severino. Total dominance over a scary Blue Jays offense to pick up the slack for Gerrit Cole's performance in last night's 6-4 loss. He also managed to strikeout Vladimir Guerrero Jr. three times by neutralizing the slugger with sharp breaking balls away.

Vintage Sevy.

For those that watch the Yankees, Luis Severino used to be a two-pitch power arm that lived in the upper 90's with a wipeout slider. This time, Severino returns off of shoulder and elbow injuries with new pitches at his disposal: a polished changeup, and most notably, that cutter. His cutter was deadly tonight and it was spotted routinely in the mid-90's. A pitch that he proved could be painted on the outer third of the plate that really opened the door for his true 4-seam heater up in the zone to put hitters away. Less foul balls and quicker outs played into his hands all night.

And what's most important about tonight's start is that Severino picked up the slack for Yankees' ace Gerrit Cole, who got touched up yesterday. Cole pitched fine other than getting annihilated by Vladdy Jr. but those runs still count and Yankees fans expect the $324 million man to get everyone out whether that's fair or not. Of course that didn't happen and pressure shifted to tonight's outing that was met with a big time game out the Yankees' two-starter.

The Yankees finished this one off by a score of 3-0 with most the damage coming from the bottom of the lineup. Recently struggling Isiah Kiner-Falefa was 3 for 3 and essentially did it all tonight dropping down a bunt single and scoring two crucial runs in a well pitched game. Back up catcher Jose Trevino also came through by driving in Kiner-Falefa. Later on in the game, Aaron Judge would provide some insurance for that wipeout Yankees bullpen with a towering double to deep left center -- The Yankees would go on to manufacture him around for their third and final run of the contest with an RBI groundout off the bat of Giancarlo Stanton.

A big win for the Yankees to win them the series and push their record to 4-3. Even bigger to know this kind of Sevy is around to take some pressure off Gerrit Cole. If the Yankees can find more consistency from those bats, look out.