AL Division Series top plays: Yankees beat Guardians, advance to ALCS

After a long rain break Monday night, the Cleveland Guardians and New York Yankees finally played Game 5 of the American League Division Series on Tuesday, with New York winning 5-1 and winning the series 3-2.

The Yankees play the Houston Astros in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series on Wednesday.

Here are the top games!

Cleveland Guardians with the New York Yankees

Stanton Smash

Nestor Cortes started for the Yankees while Aaron Civale took the bump for the Guardians.

The Yankees quickly take a 3-0 lead when Giancarlo Stanton led Civale for a three-run home run in the opposite direction.

Civale’s day is over

After giving a base hit to Josh Donaldson after Stanton’s home run, Terry Francona took the ball off Civale and challenged left Sam Hentges. Civale pitched only a third of an inning and allowed three runs at one hit, one walk and one hit per pitch.

The judge interferes in the action

The home run king of the 2022 season hit his second home run of the ALDS. Aaron Judge extended the Yankees’ lead to 4-0 with his solo jack to right field.

Scary collision

Three Yankees players quickly collided while chasing a fly ball in flat left field, resulting in a collision that injured left fielder Aaron Hicks and gave Steven Kwan a base hit.

Hicks had to be taken out of the game and Marwin Gonzalez took his place in left field.

Guardians climb onto the board

The collision with Hicks was followed by a walk to load the bases for the Guardians’ top batter Jose Ramirez. The All-Star lined a foul down the left field line that could have been a home run to tie the game if kept fair.

Ramirez later hit a sack fly at bat to level the Yankees 4-1 in the fourth.

Guardians may regret this

Andrés Giménez hit a springy grounder to first base with two outs on fourth. Yankees first baseman Anthony Rizzo had to play the ball quickly due to Giménez’s speed and appeared to pocket it to end the inning.

However, a later replay showed Giménez’s slide defeating Rizzo to first base. But it didn’t matter because the Guardians, who went 0-on-2 in challenges in Game 4, chose not to challenge the call.

Rizzo calls you

The Yankees added another run in the fifth inning when Anthony Rizzo hit a line drive to the right to hit Gleyber Torres and extend their lead to 5-1.

Jonathan Loaisiga throws two scoreless innings

Loaisiga took over for Cortes to start the sixth inning. After giving up two hits to start the inning, Loaisiga pinned both runners and went on to post a scoreless seventh. New York led 5-1 midway through the seventh and would win by that score.