ANAHEIM — The Yankees just want to turn the page on August.
The Bombers whiffed away their final game here against the Angels with two costly mistakes Wednesday night. A miss on a routine ground ball by Isiah Kiner-Falefa and a fat fastball over the plate to reigning American League MVP Shohei Ohtani by Gerrit Cole handed the Yankees a 3-2 loss.
The Yankees went 3-4 on the West Coast portion of this road trip splitting a series with the last-place A’s and losing this series to the Angles, who are the second worst team in the American League West. After going 10-18 in the month of August, the worst record in a month for a Yankee team since September 1991, the Yankees’ once 15.5-game lead in the AL East was chopped to six (five in the loss column) as they head back East to take on the Rays.
The best way for the Yankees to look at August is that it is over.
“It was brutal,” Kiner-Falefa said. “I think all of us in here are not happy about last month. It’s a long season and hopefully we can rebound from it and maybe it’ll be a wake up call for us. So we’ll try to look at the positives out of it, but we’re not happy about the last one.
“And I think we’re just so happy to turn the page.”
Kiner-Falefa’s bobble of a ground ball in the sixth inning set up the Yankees’ collapse.
The bottom of the frame began with a nearly four-minute delay while security accosted a fan who had jumped the fence. Cole threw a few pitches during the delay and when play resumed got Max Stassi to fly out to center. Josh Donaldson ranged deep to his right to get David Fletcher’s ground ball, but his throw to first was wide of a stretching DJ LeMahieu, which allowed the Angels shortstop to reach second. Mike Trout reached when Kiner-Falefa whiffed on a ground ball, not even able to get a throw off.
“Just got behind it and missed it,” Kiner-Falefa said. “No excuses. Play needs to be made in a big spot in the game. It cost us the game tonight. Not happy about it. Nothing I can do now, but I definitely feel bad for Gerrit. Definitely made some mistakes playing behind him. But I know he trusts me out there when it comes down to it. So I just gotta keep going.”
Kiner-Falefa can take some of the blame, but Cole rightfully took some too.
The Yankees ace fell behind Shohei Ohtani 2-0 and then threw a fastball right over the heart of the plate, waist high that Ohtani obliterated.
“Probably just the worst fastball of the night. A terrible spot,” Cole said. “I tried to go away and wasn’t trying to give in there either. Just a bad miss.”
The three-run, 427-foot shot that disappeared into the trees behind the center field wall gave the Angels a 3-2 lead. It was Ohtani’s 30th home run of the season and his first off of Cole in his career.
Cole allowed just those three runs, two earned, on six hits. He walked one and struck out four. That unearned run was the ninth of the month of August and the 24th the Yankees have allowed overall, still among the fewest in the majors.
“I think the defense we’re running out there is about as good as anyone,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “It’s been one of those months where it hasn’t bounced our way. When we were making those mistakes early on we were shutting it down. We gotta make sure we pick each other up.”
The Yankees were able to shut it down and pick each other up earlier in the season because they were overpowering teams with their offense. They hold a +195 run differential on the season, but finished August with a -12 on the month.
Wednesday night, they did not homer for the 35th time this season, they are 11-24 in such games.
“So now we got to play better than we have played, simple as that,” Boone said. “We got to start racking up some wins. So whether that calendar has an eight or a nine or a 10 on it, you gotta get a little better.”
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