ANAHEIM, Calif. — The only magic the Yankees’ lineup has conjured up lately is making opposing starting pitchers look unhittable.
Angels left-hander Patrick Sandoval is the best of the bunch the Yankees have faced on this road trip, which was a recipe for disaster for Aaron Boone’s club.
The Yankees could hardly touch Sandoval, or the Angels bullpen, mustering just two hits all night in another paltry offensive effort that turned into a 5-1 loss on Tuesday at Angel Stadium.
After suffering back-to-back extra-inning losses, the Yankees (50-46) spared themselves the gut punch on Tuesday and just got dominated for nine innings on the way to their eighth loss in their last 10 games.
Sandoval cruised through 7 ¹/₃ innings with seven strikeouts, giving up just a solo home run to Gleyber Torres in the third inning and a single to Anthony Volpe in the eighth.
He also issued three walks, all of them coming in the first two innings, but the Yankees could not take advantage.
The Angels (48-48) entered this series having lost 11 of their last 13 games, but the Yankees have provided them a respite.
Before Sandoval, who entered Tuesday with a 4.41 ERA, it was Angels right-hander Griffin Canning (entering with a 4.62 ERA) on Monday who struck out 12 Yankees across 5 ²/₃ innings of two-run ball.
And over the weekend in Denver, it was Rockies lefty Austin Gomber (he entered with a 6.40 ERA) and righty Chase Anderson (he entered with a 6.89 ERA) who combined for 11 innings of two-run ball against the Yankees.
The only starter on this trip that the Yankees have had their way with was Rockies right-hander Connor Seabold, whom they tagged for six runs in 2 ¹/₃ innings on Saturday.
Domingo German, meanwhile, was not his sharpest Tuesday, giving up five runs across six innings, which for this iteration of the Yankees proved too much to overcome.
A night after the Yankees’ late lead was wiped away by Shohei Ohtani’s two-run homer — Boone defended his decision not to intentionally walk him, in part because Ohtani had a “really good” hitter behind him in Mickey Moniak — Moniak lived up to the billing.
The Angels center fielder went 3-for-4 with a two-run home run and three RBIs.
Ohtani also hurt the Yankees again, ripping a low missile into the right-field corner for an RBI triple that put the Angels up 4-1 in the fifth inning.
But what the Ohtani discourse from Monday night also overshadowed was the fact the Yankees could not survive his two-run shot because they could not score more than three runs.
The Yankees fell behind early when German gave up a two-run homer to Moniak in the first inning.
Then, after German struck out the side in the second inning, he got himself in trouble in the third. He walked the bases loaded before striking out Moniak for the first out.
German then threw a wild pitch that scored the runner from third to make it 3-1 but escaped further damage by getting Taylor Ward to fly out to shallow left field and Mike Moustakas to ground out.
German gave up two more runs in the fifth inning on a rally that started by grazing Zach Neto with a curveball before Ohtani ripped his RBI triple and Moniak roped an RBI single for the 5-1 lead.
Credit: Source link
