CLEVELAND: Three home runs in the first inning and five total. A prodigious blast that nearly hit the scoreboard. An ace performance.
Friday night had just about everything for the home sellout crowd in the Indians’ 10-2 trouncing of the New York Yankees on Friday night.
It was the third sellout at Progressive Field this season and the second this week. Fans among the 34,045 who wanted to see some power got their money’s worth and then some.
The Indians led off the bottom of the first inning with back-to-back home runs against Yankees starter Chad Green (1-2, 7.04 ERA). Carlos Santana belted his 20th of the season — which already beats his 2015 total — to right field and Jason Kipnis followed with his 13th of the year to center field. It marked the first time the Indians began a game with back-to-back home runs since Kosuke Fukudome and Kipnis did it Sept. 22, 2011.
The Indians weren’t done in the first. With two outs and Francisco Lindor on first base, Lonnie Chisenhall drove a two-run shot to right field to make it 4-0.
In the third, Mike Napoli hit one of the longest home runs in Progressive Field history. With Green still on the mound, Napoli crushed a two-run homer to the top of the bleacher seats in left field. It bounced once and hit the bottom of the scoreboard and nearly hit John Adams, the famous Indians drummer, who sits atop the bleachers in the middle section. Per Statcast, it measured 460 feet and is the longest home run by an Indians hitter this season.
Along with Jim Thome’s 511-foot home run to Eagle Avenue in 1999 and Mark McGwire’s awe-inspiring shot off the scoreboard in 1997, Napoli’s homer Friday night is one of the most impressive in park history.
Lindor missed a home run in the fifth by a few feet but settled for an RBI double, and Napoli added an RBI single to make it 8-0. In the sixth, Yan Gomes grounded out to score Juan Uribe, who had doubled.
In the seventh, Kipnis added his second blast of the night, this one to right field. The five home runs as a team are the most for the Indians (52-34) in a single game this season.
It was easily enough for recent All-Star selection Corey Kluber (9-8, 3.61 ERA), who allowed one run on five hits in eight innings to go with eight strikeouts.
Catcher Brian McCann hit a solo home run for Kluber’s only blemish against the Yankees (42-44). In the ninth, Joe Colon made his major-league debut, allowing one run and striking out one.
Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Indians blog at www.ohio.com/indians. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/RyanLewisABJ.