NEW YORK — The top of the strike zone was open for business Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium, and for Bryan Woo, business was booming.
Woo returned to the site of his first career victory last June and wore out the Yankees for six dominant innings with his pair of crushing fastballs, lifting the Mariners to a 6-3 victory. Seattle reached a season-high five games above .500 in its eighth attempt and extended its season lead in the American League West to three games.
No moment was bigger in the context of the victory – at least in Woo’s player development – than his pair of punches from Juan Soto, who watched a 96.4 mph quadruple seam pass for a K back on the inside black in the first. and fought through an off-plate changeup for a third strike in the fourth.
Both sequences evoked uncomfortable body language in the batter’s box for one of the most confident hitters in the game and the early favorite for the AL Most Valuable Player award. Soto was also Woo’s final batter, and he flew out to center after falling in a 2-2 count. For good measure, Woo also blew a heater at 96.2 mph straight to Broadway past 2022 AL MVP Aaron Judge for a first-inning punchout.
“You know, when you get here, you have to be ready to go,” Woo said. “There’s no problem, falling behind and so on. Like, (the Yankees) are going to be ready to go. The crowd is. So I think it improves your game a little bit. And I think that If you really enjoy competing and being in environments like this, then it’s a lot of fun.
Why were these details so important? Beyond Soto’s pedigree, he hits from the left side, the side of the batter’s box that Woo was overpowered against in his rookie season for a .928 OPS. This year, it’s .406.
The two hits he gave up Tuesday — a single to Austin Wells and a double to Alex Verdugo that he walked for three after an error by Julio Rodríguez — came from lefties, but his overall numbers this year against them are considerably improved. .
“It’s an elite fastball,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I thought he got him to the places he wanted. He had a presence with a secondary to make it work even more for him. He was tough and kind of had his own. In that way, he was very effective too.
In three starts since being removed from the injured list due to right elbow inflammation, Woo has allowed just one run on six hits, with 15 strikeouts and two walks among the 55 batters faced. Translating from a small sample to a large sample, that’s an ERA of 0.57, a WHIP of 0.51, a K rate of 27.2%, a walk rate of 3.6%, and an OPS of 0.280 . These figures are as glaring as they are probably unsustainable, because there will inevitably be failures.
Woo’s workload is also closely monitored, which could limit the depth of games and/or season he can go through. He was on a threshold of 80-85 pitches on Tuesday, but he didn’t even reach that mark – finishing with 77 (58 strikes) – and still got off to a quality start, with the Mariners leading the AL 29th. It highlighted how valuable he can be within a rotation already considered one of the best in the game.
It’s only been three starts, but the Mariners are undefeated when Woo pitches. And Tuesday was by far his best outing yet.
Woo filled the strike zone for 15 first-pitch strikes among the 20 batters he faced and was particularly dominant with his fastball mix, using the four-seam up and the two-seam down, generating 11 misses on 37 swings for a 37.9. % whiff rate (league average is 19.4%). He also fell on just two three-pitch counts and walked zero.
“You have to pitch that way against this ballclub,” manager Scott Servais said. “You run into bad accounts, that’s what they feed on.”
Woo was buoyed in a big way by a two-run homer from the red-hot Dylan Moore in the third, then after he left, Moore ran a yard again in the ninth for a critical insurance run – marking his third career multihomer game. Ty France and Luke Raley also went deep, which gave Andrés Muñoz enough cushion to make his 10th save and second in as many nights in the Bronx.
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