Choose your word. Unforgivable. Unforgivable. Unacceptable.
The Orioles appeared in the Bronx as a piñata. They had won three times in a month (against 24 defeats). They were 50 games under 500. They were closer to the Triple-A than to the top of the AL East.
Still, the Yankees lost a series for this team, which means a few more words to choose from, such as humiliating and embarrassing. The Yanks haven’t looked right since their streak of 13-game wins, as if that would take them out of the best game, leaving them an exhausted marathoner at the 24-mile mark. Still, even for fumes, winning a series at home against Baltimore must be the same.
Instead, the piñata again won two of three. On Sunday, the Yankees jumped two three-run leads (4-1 and 7-4) and lost 8-7. They lost for so many reasons.
As they played death matches against the unmanned Orioles the previous two days, leaving the pen shortened, even more so with the revelation of the team on Sunday morning that their best reliever, Jonathan Loaisiga, was on the injured list ; an injury as great as the Yanks have suffered all season.
Because Gleyber Torres flatly turned a basic Kelvin Gutiérrez routine that should have been the end of a sixth Baltimore scorer into a gift single that brought Orioles ’best hitter, Cedric Mullins, to the plate to hit a two-run homer that started a devastating domino effect for the Yankees.
Because the Orioles appeared to have allowed 14 or more hits in a game 19 times this year (four more than any other team) and the Yankees got 14 hits in 29 innings in three games. Even on Sunday, when they scored seven runs, six of them were led by two homers by Gary Sanchez (who in his previous 23 games had a homer and six RBIs). The rest of the team had five for 30 with an RBI. After Sanchez’s second home run went 7-4 in the sixth, the Yankees went on to make it 1-12.
“It’s incredibly frustrating that we haven’t advanced our best foot in the last two days,” Aaron Boone said. “Now we have a very good and hot team that comes to play for us. We have to do better. ”
That opponent, the Blue Jays, has just generated 29 runs in three games against the A’s, who had started the series with an ERA of 3.76 before being razed. Boston is halfway through the Yanks to get the wildcard first place. The Blue Jays return 4 ¹ / ₂ and play the Orioles four games after four against the Yankees. So by not destroying the Orioles, the Yanks have become more vulnerable to losing the playoffs altogether, especially if the setback continues against Toronto.
And the Yankee launch staff is not in a good position for a series against an elite offense because:
1. The streak of 13 wins was built on one narrow victory after another: nine of them for three or fewer races and eight for one or two races. This caused a heavy workload to the pressure in the pen. The eight games since that streak (in which the Yanks are 2-6) have been decided by three or fewer races: all six defeats have been by one or two races.
2. All the headlines except Gerrit Cole have started giving too few tickets. Jordan Montgomery and Corey Kluber combined for just 8 innings in the two losses against Baltimore. The Yanks try to build Kluber in a pennant race. Jameson Taillon, who starts on Monday, has gone through the lineup once well in each of the last two outings and then collapsed. Maybe the tickets are starting to take off on a pitcher that barely launched in 2019-20.
3. The loss of Loaisiga is huge. I think it was having the best Yankee preparation season since Mariano Rivera in 1996, with a similar role in being used where needed, often to put out fires. His 24 outings, at least four outings, tied for third place in the majors and had 0.66 ERA; and an ERA of 0.45 in 10 outputs of two inputs. He directed all the lifeguards in the Fangraphs version of Wins Above Replacement.
No doubt he would have been in Sunday’s game to subdue the Orioles. But he has a tight rotating fist and won’t catch any balls for at least 10 days. Who knows if he will return this year? Zack Britton is no longer the year.
So much weight now goes to Aroldis Chapman, who seems to be struggling with his confidence, and Chad Green, who rose six on Sunday and six below. But at the time, Andrew Heaney, in particular, made such a big fuss that the Yanks asked Wandy Peralta to become his second reliever this year to pitch three days in a row.
And with all that said, the opponent over the weekend was the East. A couple of explosions could have replaced the pen. A couple of victories could have helped at least the psyche and comfort. Instead, the Yanks lost two of three.
Unforgivable. Unforgivable. Unacceptable.