Paul Goldschmidt broke a scoreless game Friday night at Citizens Bank Park, driving an opposite-field shot to right for the only run in the Yankees’ 1-0 win over the Phillies. The homer came in the top of the fourth and gave the Yankees just enough to survive a night when their bats offered almost nothing else.
That mattered because the Yankees have spent most of the past month trying to stop their offense from disappearing. Since June 18, only the Mariners have scored fewer runs, and the Yankees have scored more than three runs just once in their last seven games. They had three hits on Friday and had gone consecutive games without a homer twice in their last eight, something they had not done before since May 30-31.
Goldschmidt’s hit also carried extra weight because of where he was before the pitch arrived. He entered Friday in an 8-for-63 rut, with two doubles and one homer in his previous 19 games while striking out 24 times. The swing changed the game, but it did not erase the larger problem the Yankees keep facing. Aaron Boone said before the game that the club had not been as good as it expected offensively over the last month, and Goldschmidt said afterward that the Yankees were not content with how they had played.
He was more blunt than celebratory. Goldschmidt said the team needed to do better than it did Friday night, even with Philadelphia lefty Jesús Luzardo and the bullpen getting credit for keeping the game tight. He said the results had not been there offensively for weeks, that players were working in the cage and making adjustments as a group and individually, and that the Yankees had to keep going with confidence every time they stepped in the box.
The win was still their fourth in five games, and the pitching staff again had almost no margin for error because the offense produced so little. That is the shape of this Yankees team right now: one run can be enough to win, but only if someone like Goldschmidt supplies it at exactly the right moment. The bigger question is whether the Yankees can turn a narrow escape into something steadier before their lineup is asked to carry even more of the load.
