The scoring drought is over, but the Yankees are still looking for that “spark.” The Bombers scored a run for the first time in three games, but the Rays’ stable of pitchers held the Yankees’ struggling offense to just that and took a 3-1 win at the Stadium Tuesday night.
The Yankees (72-45) have lost three straight, 11 of their last 13 and are 3-11 in the month of August. Since the All-Star break, the Bombers have gone 8-17. The Rays (62-53) handed the Yankees their fourth straight series loss — tying the total series losses they had in the first half — and cut the Yankees’ lead in the American League East to eight games in the loss column. It’s just the second time since June 15 that the Bombers’ lead in the division has been under 10 games.
Nestor Cortes gave the Yankees seven solid innings. He allowed three runs — all in the first inning — on four hits. He did not walk a batter and struck out three. Yandy Diaz and Isaac Paredes led off with back-to-back singles and Randy Arozarena homered with one out to put the Yankees behind 3-0 before their lineup even got a chance.
Andrew Benintendi tripled off the right-center field wall with one out in the fifth. He came around and scored when Yandy Diaz bobbled Miguel Andujar’s ground ball. It was the first time the Yankees had scored a run since the ninth inning of Saturday night’s game.
But the offense that was once rolling over teams has been struggling. The Yankees have scored nine runs over their last 61 innings, spanning seven games.
“I think we’ve got a lot of key pieces out. First and foremost, I would say that that’s at the top of the list of things that we were trying to get right,” Yankees hitting coach Dillon Lawson said. “Right now we’re missing (Giancarlo) Stanton, who is looking forward to when he comes back. (Matt) Carpenter is out right now. So that’s two of your top five hitters and then DJ (LeMahieu) is out day to day or whatever he’s listed as, so then there’s your third one. And I think one of our biggest strengths for the entire season is the depth of the lineup. And so, right now, one of our biggest strengths is no longer there.”
Tuesday it was Benintendi, the No.6 hitter, and Andujar behind him, who got the Yankees started.
With Stanton and LeMahieu missing and Rizzo struggling since coming back from missing five games with lower back tightness, a lot has fallen on guys like Gleyber Torres, Josh Donaldson and Jose Trevino.
“We’ve been able to wear pitchers down,” Lawson said of the Yankees earlier offensive success. “They may get through a three or four hole hit and now you still got two or three guys with game ending type of impact. So that’s probably the biggest difference so far.”
The Yankees have averaged over five runs a game this season, but have scored just over three on average over the last two weeks. Lawson emphasized that they were still looking for ways to get better back when they were rolling over teams and they continue to do so now.
“We were. even as we were going good… constantly just evaluating the process, not resting on the fact that we’re winning games. Is it good baseball? Is it a good process? Is it what we need to be able to do later on in the season? And so for us now, that gives us comfort, going through this knowing that hey, like the process is good,” Lawson said. “You continue with this process. It allowed us to play at a high level before you know it’s constantly adjusting. It’s not to say that we’re blind to any new changes or anything like that, but I think there’s always a healthy sense of insecurity or paranoia like, are we good enough? Is this okay, let’s continue to get better. Let’s keep pecking away. And taking steps forward, even though we’re the best offense in baseball.”
()