Series Recap: Swept By Sox Again
The Yankees were absolutely not ready for this series. The Bombers — if we can even call this team that — headed to Boston and got embarrassed. Despite the scores of the first two games being close, the Red Sox were in control of all 27 innings played over the weekend. The Yankees had their best three starting pitchers on the hill and not a single one succeeded. Just a bad series from a team that has had a hard time finding an identity this season.
Game 1 (Yankees 3, Red Sox 5)
Domingo Germán and the Yankees got it shoved in their faces from the first inning of the series to the last. Germán allowed two singles, a stolen base, and two doubles immediately in the first frame of Friday night’s showdown.
For the only time over the weekend, the Yankees’ lineup fought all the way back. They loaded the bases and then tied the game up on a walk by Clint Frazier and a 2-RBI single by LeMahieu. Unfortunately, the middle of the order was unable to make the inning bigger than it was.
In the bottom of the 3rd, the Red Sox scored another run on a sacrifice fly by Hunter Renfroe. The inning would have been over, but this play by Domingo Germán allowed the Red Sox to extend their time at bat.
How did the Yankees respond? Third base coach Phil Nevin sent Gio Urshela, one of the slowest runners in baseball — fresh off of a leg injury — against one of the best outfield arms in the league. Hunter Renfroe threw Urshela out at the plate by about 20 feet.
After former Yankees prospect Garrett Whitlock retired the Yankees offense easily in the 6th and 7th innings, Jonathan Loáisiga pulled off a feat that put him in rarefied Yankee air. He struck out 4 batters in the 7th inning, becoming only the 3rd pitcher in Yankees history to do so.
After Zack Britton exited with a hamstring injury in the 8th inning, Luis Cessa allowed one more run on a Christian Vazquez single. The Yankees entered the 9th inning trailing 5-3. Gio Urshela and Miguel Andújar each hit singles to begin the inning. But then, Clint Frazier struck out and LeMahieu grounded into a game-ending double play.
Yankee of the Day: Jonathan Loáisiga (3): 1.1 IP, 0 R, 0 H, 0 BB, 4 K. Third pitcher in Yankees history to get 4 Ks in an inning.
Game 2 (Yankees 2, Red Sox 4)
The Yankees faced Nathan Eovaldi, who seemingly destroys them ever since his time in Pinstripes. In typical Yankees’ fashion, they made nothing out of two 1st inning hits thanks to a double play. However, Jordan Montgomery cruised through the 1st inning, which is usually his toughest frame, so the game had a decent feel to it.
The 2nd inning was less fun. The Yankees went down in order, then the Sox plated two runs on two infield singles, a walk, a sacrifice fly to the outfield, and a sacrifice fly to the first baseman (!!!). Oh, and Gio Urshela flipped over the railing by third base because Fenway Park has not updated their infrastructure in a thousand years.
The only good moment of the game was an opposite field blast from D.J. LeMahieu to make the score 4-1 in the 8th inning. Seeing D.J. LeMahieu get back into form is cause for a huge sigh of relief.
LeMahieu also singled in the 9th inning to bring Aaron Judge to the plate as the go-ahead run, but former Yankee Adam Ottavino struck out Judge to end the game, so the Sox won 4-2.
Yankee of the Day: D.J. LeMahieu (8): 4 for 5, HR, R, 2 RBI.
Game 3 (Yankees 2, Red Sox 9)
Gerrit Cole got absolutely shelled. He gave up two homers in the 1st inning and one homer in the 3rd inning. It was ugly.
Also, Clint Frazier does not know how to throw a baseball. He consistently misses cutoff men and makes throws 45+ feet away from where it needs to be. Sure, it is not that big of a deal in this particular instance, but it is a common pattern and is just another example of the Yankees not putting themselves in the position to succeed.
The game was already over by this point, but Aaron Judge hit a ball out of Fenway Park, which was pretty cool.
For good measure, the Red Sox piled on against Brooks Kriske and your final score ended up at 9-2.
Yankee of the Day: Aaron Judge (10): 1 for 4, HR, R, 2 RBI.
Series Talking Points
Cole’s Awful Outing: Gerrit Cole had his worst game as a Yankee and the timing was horrific. For the first time in his career, he allowed a home run on the first pitch he threw. His four runs allowed in the first inning tied a career high as well. The start capped off a series sweep at the hands of the Red Sox for the second time this season. Additionally, all of the rage is bringing up sticky stuff and how Gerrit Cole cannot pitch without it. Interestingly enough, his spin rate in this game did not have a significant decrease at all from earlier in the season. However, his command was way off. He was throwing fastballs 5 feet in the air and bouncing sliders at 55 feet. It is a major reason as to why he is having major trouble putting away hitters when he gets to 2 strikes. Cole needs to figure this out soon because the losses are compiling.
Too Many Mistakes: The weekend was another filled with fielding errors and misplays for the Yanks. Domingo Germán made an atrocious error. Gleyber Torres made two awful plays on Sunday. Luke Voit allowed a runner to score on a popup 20 feet behind first base. Phil Nevin sent a hobbled Gio Urshela, despite Renfroe fielding the ball in shallow right field prior to Urshela reaching third base. Clint Frazier missed the cutoff man three times in one game on Sunday. Miguel Andújar let an easy fly ball from Bogaerts land in front of the Green Monster and turn into a double. There were so many mistakes that it is impossible to keep up. The Yankees have so many guys playing out of position, too many guys that do not have a position, and a lot of players that do not have speed to make up for any poor baserunning decisions.
So what is the solution? Do you fire Aaron Boone? Do you call up players from the minors? Well, firing Aaron Boone is not going to make Clint Frazier or Miguel Andújar a superb outfielder. It probably is not going to make Gleyber Torres hit. It likely does not stop Gerrit Cole from giving up 6 runs. It might make the team play with more urgency and stop this laid-back “We’re the Yankees” crap. It might mean that a manager will take over that will actually tell Giancarlo Stanton he has to play the outfield if he wants to earn $30M per season. But it might also do absolutely nothing. But there is absolutely no way it could get worse. So, if you are Aaron Boone, the team cannot get worse by firing you… that means you have to be on the hot seat, at least a little bit. In the end, this team is what it is until new players are brought in. Is Hoy Jun Park the answer? Trey Amburgey? Estevan Florial? I am not sure, but they could not be worse than what we are seeing from Andújar, Frazier, and Gardner on a daily basis.
Britton and Peralta Injured: Zack Britton (strained hamstring) went on the 10-day injured list. He says he will not get an MRI because he does not think he needs one. That is a scary thing to hear. Hopefully, the injury is nothing major and he is back in the minimum 10 days, but whenever I hear that a player is not getting the injury fully examined, I think about when Severino refused to get an MRI on his shoulder, which ultimately led to him missing a full season on top of the time he had originally missed.
Wandy Peralta went on the 10-day injured list with a lower back injury. Not that Peralta has been great recently, but that means the Yankees are short two lefty arms in the bullpen.
How To Sum Up The Weekend: This just about does it.
Series Totals
Hitting
D.J. LeMahieu: 7 for 14 (.500 AVG), 0 BB (.500 OBP), 2 R, 1 HR, 4 RBI, 1 K (1.214 OPS), 0 SB
Giancarlo Stanton: 2 for 10 (.200 AVG), 2 BB (.333 OBP), 1 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 7 K (.533 OPS), 0 SB
Aaron Judge: 3 for 12 (.250 AVG), 1 BB (.308 OBP), 1 R, 1 HR, 2 RBI, 2 K (.808 OPS), 0 SB
Luke Voit: 3 for 12 (.250 AVG), 0 BB (.250 OBP), 1 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 5 K (.500 OPS), 0 SB
Gio Urshela: 2 for 12 (.167 AVG), 0 BB (.167 OBP), 1 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 2 K (.417 OPS), 0 SB
Gleyber Torres: 2 for 12 (.167 AVG), 0 BB (.167 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 3 K (.333 OPS), 0 SB
Gary Sánchez: 1 for 7 (.143 AVG), 3 BB (.400 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 2 K (.543 OPS), 0 SB
Clint Frazier: 1 for 6 (.167 AVG), 2 BB (.375 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 1 RBI, 3 K (.542 OPS), 0 SB
Brett Gardner: 0 for 3 (.000 AVG), 1 BB (.250 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 2 K (.250 OPS), 0 SB
Kyle Higashioka: 1 for 2 (.500 AVG), 0 BB (.500 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 1 K (1.000 OPS), 0 SB
Miguel Andújar: 3 for 10 (.300 AVG), 1 BB (.364 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 2 K (.664 OPS), 0 SB
Rougned Odor: 0 for 1 (.000 AVG), 0 BB (.000 OBP), 1 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 0 K (.000 OPS), 0 SB
Tyler Wade: 0 for 0 (.000 AVG), 0 BB (.000 OBP), 0 R, 0 HR, 0 RBI, 0 K (.000 OPS), 0 SB
Pitching
Domingo Germán: 4 IP, 4 R, 3 ER, 5 H, 1 BB, 0 HR, 3 Ks, 6.75 ERA
Jordan Montgomery: 6 IP, 3 R, 3 ER, 8 H, 2 BB, 0 HR, 5 Ks, 4.50 ERA
Gerrit Cole: 5 IP, 6 R, 5 ER, 8 H, 2 BB, 3 HR, 6 Ks, 9.00 ERA
Brooks Kriske: 1 IP, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 H, 0 BB, 1 HR, 1 K, 18.00 ERA
Albert Abreu: 2 IP, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 H, 0 BB, 0 HR, 1 K, 4.50 ERA
Lucas Luetge: 1.2 IP, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 H, 2 BB, 0 HR, 2 Ks, 0.00 ERA
Zack Britton: 0.1 IP, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 H, 1 BB, 0 HR, 0 Ks, 27.00 ERA
Jonathan Loáisiga: 1.1 IP, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 H, 0 BB, 0 HR, 4 Ks, 0.00 ERA
Luis Cessa: 2.2 IP, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 H, 0 BB, 0 HR, 1 K, 3.38 ERA
Aroldis Chapman: No appearances.
Chad Green: No appearances.
Wandy Peralta: No appearances.
Nestor Cortes Jr.: No appearances.
Michael King: No appearances.
Jameson Taillon: No appearances.