NEW YORK — Gleyber Torres hit solo homers in consecutive at-bats and the New York Yankees beat the Cleveland Indians 6-5 on Saturday afternoon at Yankee Stadium in a game with a wild argument that resulted in three New York ejections.
Torres homered in the fourth off Zach Plesac (6-4) and in the sixth off Nick Wittgren. It was his major league-leading seventh multi-homer game this season and ninth of his career.
After Torres hit his 29th homer to give New York a 6-4 lead, Cameron Maybin struck out looking on a full count pitch that he thought was outside. He turned around and questioned the call.
Home plate umpire Ben May then twice looked at the Yankee dugout and Boone was promptly ejected. Boone raced out to continue the argument while gesturing at May. Second base umpire Tom Hallion intervened, and Boone returned to continue the argument.
Before the next pitch was thrown, May glanced at the dugout and bench coach Josh Bard began arguing. Brett Gardner banged his bat on top of the dugout, jumped over the dugout railing and was thrown out by first base umpire Phil Cuzzi and then began arguing with third base umpire Todd Tichenor.
Yankees left-hander CC Sabathia also was tossed by Cuzzi and the sequence continued with Gardner yelling at Hallion before order was restored.
It was the third time in the last month that the Yankees were involved in a wild argument with umpires.
On July 18, Boone was tossed for profanely berating rookie umpire Brennan Miller in his viral “savages in the box” rant. On Aug. 9 in Toronto, Gardner was tossed by plate umpire Chris Segal after a strikeout to Maybin.
Didi Gregorius and DJ LeMahieu also homered for the Yankees, who won for the 15th time in 18 games. Gregorius homered two pitches before Torres connected in the fourth and LeMahieu snapped a 4-4 tie in the fifth.
Maybin scored New York’s first run on an error by Cleveland left fielder Oscar Mercado in the second and LeMahieu had an RBI single that tied the game at 2-2 in the third.
New York left-hander James Paxton (9-6) won his fourth straight start, allowing four runs on six hits. He struck out four and walked three. Adam Ottavino and Tommy Kahnle pitched a scoreless inning apiece before Zack Britton got an inning-ending double play to end the eighth.
Aroldis Chapman tossed a scoreless ninth for his 35th save in 40 chances.
Carlos Santana drove in three runs for Cleveland, which is 44-21 since June 4.
He hit a two-run single and then added a run-scoring single in the fifth. Yasiel Puig hit a game-tying single in the fifth before the Yankees regained the lead and Puig later scored on a wild pitch by Britton in the eighth.
Plesac allowed five runs (four earned) on six hits in 4 2/3 innings. — Reuters
