Anthony Rizzo’s clutch hit propels Yankees to sweep of Angels

It wasn’t a perfect day — Jameson Taillon fell six outs short of that — but it was pretty satisfying.

The Yankees’ long Thursday started with a beat-down, ended with some dramatics and included Taillon flirting with history.

The end result was two wins, 6-1 and 2-1, over the Angels in a split-admission doubleheader in The Bronx as the best-in-baseball Yankees swept the three-game series in impressive fashion.

Pinch-hitter Anthony Rizzo’s two-out, two-run single in the eighth inning of Game 2, after the Yankees had gone 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position, made a winner out of Taillon, who pitched seven perfect innings before finally allowing a hit, and then a run, in the eighth.

The opener was very different. The Yankees jumped on Shohei Ohtani early with three solo home runs and Nestor Cortes was again brilliant in a one-sided victory.

After Taillon’s seven flawless innings in the second game, Jared Walsh ended the right-hander’s bid for history. He ripped a high 0-2 fastball up the middle and Isiah Kiner-Falefa couldn’t quite get to it. The shortstop made a dive, but the ball caromed off him into shallow left-center field and Walsh wound up on second with a double. Taillon promptly received a standing ovation for his efforts.

Anthony Rizzo belts a game-winning two-run single in the eighth inning, giving Jameson Taillon (left) the victory in the Yankees’ 2-1 win over the Angels in Game 2. Robert Sabo; AP

After Taillon retired the next two hitters, those cheers were replaced by groans. Taillon left a 1-2 slider up and Kurt Suzuki lined it into left field to drive home Walsh to give the Angels a 1-0 lead.

Taillon was looking to become the fourth Yankee to throw a perfect game, joining David Cone, David Wells and Don Larsen, who accomplished the rare feat in the 1956 World Series. The most recent perfect game in the majors was thrown by Felix Hernandez of the Mariners on Aug. 15, 2012.

After Rizzo’s clutch single off Angels reliever Archie Bradley drove in Miguel Andujar, who had doubled, and Kiner-Falefa, Taillon wound up a winner.

Clay Holmes worked a scoreless ninth for his seventh save, shaking off a bout of wildness by retiring Luis Rengifo with the bases loaded to end it.

Anthony Rizzo celebrates at first base after hitting a game-winning two-run single in the eighth inning of the Yankees’ Game 2 win. Robert Sabo

In Game 1, Ohtani failed to record an out in the fourth inning as he was battered in The Bronx for the second consecutive year. Adding to his lost day on the mound, Ohtani was also picked off first base by Cortes in the fifth inning after his lone hit.

“They’re really good at reading pitches. They’re very good at it,” Angels manager Joe Maddon said.

When asked about Ohtani only registering three swings and misses on 75 pitches, Maddon said: “That’s unusual, very unusual. But I’m not accusing anybody of anything, except that they’re good at it. If you’re able to acquire things through natural means I’m all into it, I think it’s great.”

Yankees manager Aaron Boone, asked about his team’s ability to read pitches, said: “Hopefully we continue to be good at it.”

The opener included an hour and 28-minute rain delay after eight innings that only delayed the inevitable Yankees victory.

Poor as Ohtani’s outing was, it wasn’t quite as bad as his first start in The Bronx, last June 30, when he was torched for seven earned runs on seven hits in two-thirds of an inning. The Angels rallied for an 11-8 victory that day with a seven-run ninth inning.

History didn’t repeat itself.

Cortes twirled seven shutout innings, lowering his ERA to a miniscule 1.50 — the second-lowest in all of baseball — while striking out seven and allowing five hits. It was the sixth start this year in which he yielded one earned run or fewer, a stunning run for the former 36th-round pick who has come out of anonymity to be one of the premier pitchers in the game this year.

“I can’t sit here and tell you I don’t look at the numbers. I obviously look at the numbers. I look at everything everybody posts and everybody says,” Cortes said. “It’s been pretty special. … I try to compete. With that, I’ve had a lot of success.”