NEW YORK — Noah Syndergaard’s return to New York didn’t go as he or the Angels would have hoped.
Syndergaard, who starred for the New York Mets before undergoing Tommy John surgery, gave up five runs in the Angels’ 9-1 loss to the New York Yankees on Tuesday night. It stretched the Angels’ losing streak to six games.
Syndergaard certainly would have liked to show New York fans – albeit not the same ones – that he could still be the kind of pitcher he was during his glory days with the Mets.
Instead, he couldn’t make it out of the third inning.
Syndergaard endured his second miserable start in three outings, ironically with his best start in between.
After getting knocked out in the first in Texas on May 16, Syndergaard gave up one run in eight innings in his last start, and then he crashed back to earth by allowing five runs in New York.
Syndergaard was not pounding the strike zone the way he did in his previous outing. He fell behind constantly in the first inning, starting with a four-pitch walk to Aaron Judge with one out.
Syndergaard actually was ahead 1-and-2 against Anthony Rizzo, but he left a fastball over the middle of the plate and Rizzo hammered it into the gap in right-center, driving in a run.
Gleyber Torres yanked a first-pitch fastball off the left-field fence, driving in another. The Angels then caught a break because Torres came off the bag after he’d safely reached third.
That saved the Angels a run because Miguel Andujar followed with a single and then Matt Carpenter lofted a fly ball into the seats in right field, making it 4-0.
Syndergaard gave up another run in the second, and he was pulled with one out in the third.
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Left-hander Kenny Rosenberg managed to soak up five innings of relief, which certainly will help the Angels have a fresh bullpen for Wednesday’s game.
Although the Angels had plenty of innings left to get back in the game after Syndergaard put them in a 5-0 hole, they couldn’t do much with Yankees lefty Jordan Montgomery. He did not give up a run until a Luis Rengifo homer in the seventh, which made it 7-1. Shohei Ohtani was robbed of a first-inning home run by center fielder Aaron Judge, who needed all of his 6-foot-7 frame to reach over the fence and snag the ball.
The Angels didn’t get a runner in scoring position until the fifth. Two of their seven hits came from Jared Walsh, both against Montgomery. Walsh has continued to show improvement against lefties.
More to come on this story.