Extra-inning home runs in the clinching game of a postseason series are not, as you might imagine, common things. This is noteworthy right about now because New York Yankees slugger Juan Soto in Saturday night’s Game 5 of the ALCS all but sent his team to the World Series with his 10th-inning blast against the Cleveland Guardians.
As rare as such moments are, there’s a, shall we say, decidedly pinstriped coincidence to be found within Soto’s game-turning homer at Progressive Field. Just two Yankees have ever done such a thing – i.e., hitting an extra-inning home run in the clinching game of a postseason series – and Soto, as you know, is one of them.
Soto’s was set up by Giancarlo Stanton, who hit a game-tying homer in the sixth inning of Game 5. Without that clutch blast, Soto’s clutch blast, since it came in extras, might never have come to pass. Soto with two outs and two on and the game tied 2-2 stepped in against reliever Hunter Gaddis, who had pitched to a 1.57 ERA during the regular season and allowed just four home runs in 74 2/3 innings. However, he’d been worked hard in the ALCS. Soto’s seven-pitch duel with Gaddis on Saturday night was a barrage of takes and foul balls, sliders and changeups, until Soto finally got what he wanted: a fastball up in the zone. You know what happened next:
That’s a pennant-winning homer for the Yankees.
Speaking of which, it’s about time we mention that other extra-inning home run in the clinching game of a postseason series for the Yankees. Authoring it was Soto’s manager, Aaron Boone. Let’s go back to Oct. 16, 2003. It’s the 11th inning of Game 7 of the ALCS between the Yankees and blood-rival Red Sox, and the score is tied 5-5. Boone had entered the game in the eighth inning as a pinch-runner for Ruben Sierra and then remained in the game at third base. He didn’t bat until he led off the 11th against knuckleballer Tim Wakefield. Boone fancied the first pitch he saw from Wakefield and did this to it:
Boone’s of course was a walk-off at Yankee Stadium, and Soto’s was not. However, all of this is symmetry enough for us.
In some ways, what Soto did as a Yankee wasn’t all that unusual – the Yankees have six extra-inning postseason home runs since 2000, which seems like a lot. But to do it in a series-clinching game is something else altogether. As it turns out, only Soto’s manager can directly relate to that particular feeling, at least as Yankees go.
