Christian Yelich Hits For Cycle In Wild Brewers Win; Ryan LaMarre Leads White Sox Past Yankees

Players of the Day for Wednesday, August 29, 2018

LaMarre: 3-for-4, HR, 4RBI

American League

The Yankees schedule the past three weeks couldn't have been much easier, but somehow the Chicago White Sox nearly swept them, taking two of three at Yankees Stadium with Wednesday's 4-1 victory.

While Reynaldo Lopez (5-9) was holding the Yanks to one run on five hits over seven innings, Ryan LaMarre was taking care of business at the plate, driving in all four Chicago runs.

LaMarre doubled twice and homered in four at-bats. In 16 games with the White Sox he's batting .364 with two homers and seven RBI.

The 26-year-old had already played for Cincinnati, Boston, Oakland and Minnesota over four years before joining the White Sox mid-season.

Chicago is hopelessly out of contention, but the Yankees dropped back to 7 1/2 games behind Boston in the AL East. With both Oakland and Seattle losing, New York still has a comfortable, 4 1/2-game bulge over the A's in the wild card race. Seattle is 10 games back.

The Yankees host four games with Detroit beginning Thursday.

National League

Yelich hits for cycle

The 11,777 fans who went out to see game two of the three-game series between the Reds and Brewers at Great American Ball Park certainly got their money's worth for the price of admission.

After a 27-minute rain delay to start the game, they witnessed a 10-inning, 13-12 win by the Brewers featuring a combined total of 36 hits, scoring in every inning except the third and ninth, and Christian Yelich going 6-for-6 while hitting for the cycle.

The Brewers won it when Jesus Aguilar socked a solo homer in the top of the 10th and Erik Kratz singled home Hernan Perez. They needed both runs because Brandon Dixon hit a solo home run in the bottom of the inning.

Yelich did everything besides throw batting practice. In the first inning, he singled and scored. In the second, he legged out an infield single. His two-run homer in the fifth gave the Brewers a short-lived 4-3 lead. Yelich doubled in the sixth and tripled in the seventh inning, driving in Lorenzo Cain, to complete the cycle. In the ninth, he got his sixth hit, another infield single, finishing with three RBI and two runs. He also played both left and right field.

Yelich, 26, came to Milwaukee from Miami following the 2017 season. He's leading the National League with a .319 batting average, to go with 26 home runs, 75 RBI and 14 stolen bases.

Milwaukee's win moved them to within five games of the Cubs in the central division. St. Louis is 4 1/2 back in second place and also holds the top wild card slot.

The Brewers will look to take the series when they meet up with the Reds on Thursday. Game time is 12:35 pm EDT.