Stanton fuels Yankees' comeback with his bat and ... his legs?

NEW YORK – The Yankees have spent the season’s first week highlighting aggressiveness and athleticism as their defining traits. On Saturday, they added a new one to the list: resilience.

Giancarlo Stanton caught the Marlins napping on the basepaths, then delivered a tiebreaking two-run single as the Yankees rallied for a 9-7 victory on a raw, rainy night at Yankee Stadium.

“If there’s outs on the board, we’ve got a chance,” Stanton said. “We’ve got a lot of capable guys, one through nine, and even off the bench. It took more than one through nine today, so that shows our resilience.”

The Yankees are a Major League-best 7-1, matching the best start through eight decisions in franchise history and marking their first time winning seven of their first eight in a full season since 2003.

• Gil set to return to Yankees rotation

“That’s a great win,” said Cody Bellinger, who ignited the comeback with a two-run homer in the fifth. “Wins come in many different ways, and that was just a well-fought-out game. Both teams kept punching each other back.”

New York chipped away to erase an early four-run deficit. Bellinger’s first homer of the season chased starter Max Meyer and atoned for his fourth-inning throwing error, which allowed a run to score.

A three-run sixth flipped the game, with run-scoring hits from Trent Grisham and Aaron Judge before Bellinger lifted a sacrifice fly to give the Yanks their first lead.

“The quality of at-bats never went away,” manager Aaron Boone said. “It’s a scoring competition, not a hit competition. It seemed like everyone had a big at-bat tonight in some way, shape or form.”

Stanton led off the seventh with a walk, and with Miami neglecting to hold him on, the 36-year-old notched his first stolen base since Game 3 of the 2024 American League Division Series against the Royals.

“If they’re going to give it to me like that, I’ve got to go get it,” said Stanton, whose last regular-season steal came in August 2020. “I’m going to take what they give me and understand where I’m at each day.”

After advancing on a groundout, Stanton chugged home on a passed ball, to the delight of his teammates on the dugout rail.

“That was good – the boys were fired up,” Bellinger said. “That was a huge extra run there. He’s just playing really well, and it’s really good to see.”

Not much came as smoothly as that Stanton trip around the bases.

Ryan Weathers labored through 3 2/3 innings, throwing 88 pitches (53 strikes) and becoming the first Bombers starter to allow at least three runs this season.

“I was ahead in the counts and just couldn’t put guys away,” Weathers said. “When I was over the plate tonight, I gave up a lot of weak contact and some weak hits. Those, I just have to live with them. This offense can win us a lot of ballgames.”

Camilo Doval had a rocky outing in the eighth, surrendering Javier Sanoja’s game-tying two-run double. The Yanks responded in the home half – including Stanton’s grounder facing Michael Petersen, which scooted past shortstop Otto Lopez to put New York on top.

“He gave me his whole arsenal, so I just wanted to stay back and make them play defense,” Stanton said. “It wasn’t ideal conditions out there, so as long as I put the ball in play, it was important.”

The ninth got messy. Jazz Chisholm Jr. was slow delivering a throw to first base after fielding Lopez’s inning-opening grounder, a play that Boone said should have been completed.

“He just kind of laid back on it,” Boone said. “Credit to Lopez, who was getting down the line in a hurry. [Chisholm] probably figured he had plenty of time. But when he’s got to close on it, we’ve got to make that one.”

Lopez was credited with an infield hit that set the tone for David Bednar’s 33-pitch inning – just three nights after he needed 40 pitches to navigate an outing in Seattle.

With the bases loaded, Bednar dug deep, striking out Griffin Conine on three pitches to seal his fourth save. He described the drama of the entire ninth inning as: “Buckle up, find a way, no matter what.”

“I think it just shows the grit of our ballclub,” Bednar said. “We’ve got a really talented group. It really tested us today, but we came out on top.”