Aaron Boone went to Matt Carpenter in the bottom of the sixth inning Friday, pinch-hitting the lefty-hitter for Jose Trevino with two on and two out.
It was Carpenter’s first at-bat since he fractured his left foot when he fouled a pitch off it on Aug. 8.
Facing right-hander Trevor Stephan, Carpenter struck out, and the Yankees were unable to get any hits with runners in scoring position in a 4-2, 10-inning loss to the Guardians in Game 2 of the ALDS in The Bronx.
“That’s our shot right there,” Boone said of the decision to pinch hit with Carpenter. “Not our [only] shot, but it’s first and second, two outs. Let’s go. … You can’t always wait around; you start waiting forever. Any time we had a really good leverage situation and a matchup we liked, I was going to go with it.”
Boone didn’t pull the trigger on another possible pinch-hitting scenario in the bottom of the 10th. He kept Tim Locastro, who had come in to pinch run for Giancarlo Stanton in the eighth inning, in the game to hit against Emmanuel Clase to lead off the inning.
Boone pointed to the fact Clase is good at getting lefties out and doesn’t walk many batters, which made him stay away from the switch-hitting Aaron Hicks.
“I was ready to hit,” said Hicks, who said he was told he would have gotten the at-bat if the Guardians had brought in right-hander Enyel De Los Santos instead of sticking with Clase.
Hicks had a mostly miserable regular season in which he got benched in the middle of a game for a pair of defensive miscues and never got going offensively.
Since Harrison Bader has gotten healthy and Oswaldo Cabrera has emerged as a solid option in the outfield, Hicks has gotten very little playing time.
Bader has lived up to his reputation as an excellent defensive center fielder since recovering from plantar fasciitis, but he took a poor route to Josh Naylor’s double to the warning track that drove in a run in the top of the 10th.
Outfielders on both teams struggled with the sun Friday afternoon, and Bader said it affected him on that play.
“It was hit pretty deep out there and right into the sun, but I think I can catch every ball hit out there,” Bader said. “I didn’t take a good route to it. … I got beat there.”
Josh Donaldson spoke for the first time since he was caught off first base after he believed his fly ball to right field in Game 1 on Tuesday was a homer.
“I thought the ball had skipped off the top of the wall,” Donaldson said. “Then I heard the music [in the stadium] and I was like, ‘I guess it’s a homer.’ ”
Boone called it a “weird play” and chose not to criticize Donaldson for the mistake.
Andrew Benintendi (fractured hook of hamate bone in right wrist) is still in play to be on the roster for the ALCS if the Yankees advance. He hit off the high-velocity machine at the Stadium on Thursday and is among the players heading to Tampa on Saturday to work out at the team’s complex there.
Boone said Bentinendi will face live pitching over the weekend.
On the pitching side, Ron Marinaccio (shin stress reaction) will also throw live batting practice in Tampa, with an eye on the ALCS.
And Frankie Montas (shoulder) has thrown a pair of bullpen sessions that “went well,” according to Boone, and will also throw in Tampa.
While the right-hander, who has been a bust since his arrival from Oakland, could be an option out of the pen in later rounds, Boone said Montas is “certainly not” going to be able to be used as a starter this postseason.
Because of the rainout Thursday, Friday was the Yankees’ first postseason game to start at 1 p.m. since Game 3 of the 2009 ALCS against the Angels in Anaheim. That was the most recent of the Yankees’ 27 championship seasons.
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