Aaron Judge, Franchy Cordero take O’s deep in Yanks’ rubber game win

BALTIMORE — With his first two-homer day of the season — and the 28th of his career — Aaron Judge now leads the Yankees with four home runs.

The outfielder’s first longball of Sunday’s game, a 5-3 rubber game win for the Yankees, took right-hander Tyler Wells to straightaway center field in the third inning for a solo shot. Judge seems to enjoy at-bats against the Orioles starter, as two of his 62 home runs in 2022 came against Wells on July 22 last year.

But it was Orioles reliever Logan Gillaspie who surrendered Judge’s second blast, a liner to left field in the eighth.

In addition to pacing the Yankees in homers, Judge is now tied for the team lead in RBI with seven.

He shares that space with Franchy Cordero, who showed the Orioles that he can hit the ball hard during spring training. He spent the weekend reminding them of his capabilities — while wearing the Yankees’ road grays.

Cordero raked for Baltimore during exhibition play, slashing .413/.426/.674 with four doubles, one triple, two home runs and nine RBI. But the corner outfielder — Cordero can also play first — didn’t make the team and was released on March 27 after opting out of his deal.

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The Yankees signed Cordero three days later and swiftly added him to their Opening Day roster.

It didn’t take long for Cordero to exact revenge on the team that passed on him. After hitting his first home run of the year at Camden Yards on Friday, Cordero mashed a Wells pitch over the ballpark’s right field scoreboard on Sunday for a two-run bomb in the fifth inning.

Cordero hasn’t been an everyday player with the Yankees, but the lefty swinger has made his presence felt when in the lineup. He’s hitting .357 with a 1.257 OPS over four games.

The Yankees also scored in the first after a series of singles, including one that dropped between Orioles third baseman Gunnar Henderson and left fielder Austin Hays. Giancarlo Stanton picked up the RBI.

On the mound, Nestor Cortes provided another solid start, his second of the season, throwing 5.1 innings of two-run ball. The runs were charged to Cortes when Anthony Santander welcomed reliever Albert Abreu to the game with a two-run double.

Cortes finished the game with four hits allowed, two walks, five strikeouts, 91 pitches and one equipment adjustment after umpire Bill Miller took issue with the southpaw’s 44 brand glove early in the game.

The otherwise black mitt — which Cortes used without issue against the Phillies in his first start — featured a white logo, which prompted a conversation with Miller.  When Cortes returned to the mound the next inning, the logo appeared to be filled in with a black marker.

Ron Marinaccio and Jimmy Cordero followed Abreu. The former recorded two outs without allowing a run, but Adley Rutschman tanked a solo homer off Cordero in the eighth.

Cordero, whose lack of command helped the Orioles win on Friday, now has a 4.91 ERA over five appearances this season.

Clay Holmes took over in the ninth and picked up his third save of the year.