Yankees Sink to New Depths of Despair

After three miserable losses in a row to the mediocre Angels, the Yankees ended their six-game losing streak on Thursday to avoid what would have been an unfathomable four-game sweep. But you can count me as someone who doesn’t believe for a second that their problems are suddenly solved. Lets get to it.

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Sorry, but one win on Thursday over the Los Angeles Angels, which meant the Yankees avoided the indignity of getting swept four straight at Yankee Stadium, means almost nothing to me.

Sure, winning is better than losing, but really, my thought when the 7-3 victory was wrapped up was big deal. One win didn’t come close to erasing the embarrassment of losing the first three games to that team, on top of having lost three to the Red Sox last weekend, a six-game skid during which they played some of the worst offensive baseball in the history of the franchise.

And because of that, what was once a comfortable seven-game lead in the AL East on May 28 has been reduced to 2.5 games (it was down to 1.5 before Thursday) because while the Yankees were puking all over themselves the past week, the ever-annoying Rays have surged. The Jays are also right there just three out, and even the god damn Red Sox, who were 10.5 out on June 6 are within five games. Good job fellas, way to bring everyone back into play.

What a brutal stretch, and there isn’t a position player who wasn’t partially responsible for the implosion. The pitching was fine, even very good, but the offense was laughable. In the seven games before Thursday, which also included the 1-0 win over the Royals last Thursday, the Yankees hit .156 as a team with just three home runs, they were 5-for-48 (.104) with runners in scoring position while stranding 44 runners, and their OPS was .456.

It was the second time in franchise history they scored seven runs or fewer in a seven-game span while also losing at least six of the games. The other time came Sept. 1-7, 1908. They also became the first team in AL history to score seven runs or fewer and strike out 60-plus times over a seven-game period.

As always, Aaron Boone showed no awareness of just how bad this was. He sat in front of reporters three nights in a row saying this is just a blip, trying to convince everyone that this Yankees offense is still great.

“I get the historic part just because we got shut out a few times, but it’s a few days out of 162, so that to me is a snapshot - especially as good an offense as we are,” he said. “I get the noise around being shut out three days in a row, but it’s more when these things become weeks.”

But who’s to tell if this slump won’t go on for weeks? Did one game cure it? We’ve seen this team go into month-long funks before, and should we buy it that all of the Yankees’ ills were cured because in the finale they scored seven runs against four pitchers whose best ERA by the end of the day was 4.30?

I guess we’ll find out this weekend when Baltimore comes to town for three games. The Orioles are one of the most disappointing teams in MLB this season as they sit in last place in the AL East with a gory record of 32-42. If ever a game encapsulated their season, it was Wednesday night when they blew an 8-0 lead and lost 12-8 to the Rays.

Even after shutting down the Yankees three times, the Angels leave the Bronx with a terrible team ERA of 4.67 which is seventh-worst in MLB, but the Orioles come to town with a 4.98 ERA, fourth-worst. If the Yankees can’t hit and score against these guys, holy shit.

“It’s a long season when you’re playing well, it’s a long season when you’re losing a few games in a row,” Paul Goldschmidt said. “We understand that. We’ve done a good job just taking it day-by-day and [Thursday] was a good example of that. We’ll do that the whole year and see what happens. I know the results haven’t been there, but I didn’t feel like we really tried to do anything different. The margins are so thin in this game, the margins between a homer and an out to the warning track.”

June 16: Angels 1, Yankees 0 (11)

➤ I was so pissed watching the Yankees lose three times to the Red Sox, but I think I was even more pissed that they lost this game, and the next, and the next, because they were so inconceivably shitty at the plate against a shitty team with a bunch of shitty pitchers. Banging my head against a wall would have been more enjoyable than wasting the first three nights of my week watching this series, but let’s deal here with just the first debacle in this section.

➤ This was staggering incompetence all night at the plate, but especially in the last three innings. How in the living hell do you have a runner on second base with no outs in the ninth, 10th and 11th and not score one run? It’s almost impossible, but the Yankees did it. Also almost impossible, they went 1-for-18 with runners in scoring position.

➤ Giancarlo Stanton made his return a good one with two hits including a leadoff double in the ninth. Jasson Dominguez pinch ran and he made another out on the bases, though it wasn’t all his fault. He was running when Anthony Volpe hit a grounder right to third and the ball got to Luis Rengifo just as Dominguez was arriving for an unbelievably unlucky out. Volpe then stole second, but Austin Wells whiffed.

➤ In the 10th, DJ LeMahieu failed to get a bunt down, then struck out, about as useless an at bat as possible, and two fly outs left the free runner stranded. And then in the 11th, Aaron Judge - deep, deep in his first prolonged slump - was walked intentionally so they had first and second, no outs. Cody Bellinger hit a ball that I thought was gone but somehow stayed in the park. Goldschmidt took third and when Dominguez hit a weak grounder past the mound, Goldy was gunned down by a mile at the plate. Jazz Chisholm singled to load the bases and then the Angels brought in Hunter Strickland with two outs and Volpe swung at a shitty first pitch and grounded right to third again to end the game.

➤ Through this game, the Yankees had scored just five runs in five games, their fewest in any five-game span since Aug. 5-9, 2015. The Angels also became the first team since the Rangers in 1990 to beat the Yankees 1-0 in an extra-inning game.

➤ Clarke Schmidt was great, and what a waste of a career-high tying 7.2 innings of shutout ball where he allowed four hits and no walks. His night ended when Judge stupidly dove for a line drive and turned a single into a two-out triple, but Fernando Cruz stranded the runner with a strikeout. Devin Williams made us sweat in the ninth allowing two hits but he escaped, and then Jonathan Loaisiga was great in the 10th, but he got burned in the 11th on an excuse-me opposite field lollipop down the left field line for an RBI double by Nolan Schanuel. What a way to lose.

What they said in Monday’s clubhouse

• Boone on Schmidt: “Maybe as good as he’s been, that’s saying something because he’s had a lot of really good outings. I just thought he was so efficient, even his misses. … He wasn’t spraying the ball at all, which he has done at times this year. I thought he was just really sharp with his stuff. … He’s expanded his arsenal a little bit.”

• Boone on the offense: “I thought enough guys up and down the lineup had some hard-hit balls, had some good contact, but when you’re not hitting the ball out of the ballpark and you’re having a hard time scoring runs, you have to take advantage of some situational things that come up. We had some leverage there late with a runner on second, and just couldn’t push it [across].”

June 17: Angels 4, Yankees 0

➤ Be honest, you knew this game was over the moment the Angels scored a two-out run in the second. Logan O’Hoppe doubled off Will Warren, and then Rengifo hit a grounder to second, not an easy play, but one that LeMahieu - who is turning into a fossil before our eyes - should have made. He didn’t, the ball went into right, O’Hoppe scored, game over because the Yankees continued to embarrass themselves at the plate.

➤ This was even more incomprehensible than the night before, which is exactly what Michael Kay said at the end of the game. The Angels started Kyle Hendricks, a guy who can’t break glass with his fastball. Dating back to 2021, his last three years with the Cubs and this season with the Angels, his ERA is 4.80 and his WHIP is 1.323. Since the start of 2024, among all pitchers with at least 200 innings pitched, his ERA was dead last in MLB. The Yankees should have killed him and instead they managed four hits and a walk in six innings, then didn’t get a hit in the last three innings against three relievers, two of whom have ERA’s north of 4.50.

➤ This was the third consecutive shutout, tying the franchise record set six previous times, the last in 2016. And it extended their scoreless streak to 29 straight innings, and they now had five runs in their last 59 innings dating back to the last two innings Wednesday in Kansas City. Embarrassing.

➤ Warren was very good as he struck out a career-high 11 men in six innings. He gave up four straight singles in the third, the last of those by Taylor Ward on a play that Chisholm should have made but didn’t, and two runs scored to make it 3-0 which felt like 30-0.

➤ As pathetic as it was that the Yankees went 1-for-18 with runners in scoring position Monday, it was even worse that they had only three chances in this game, and of course had no hits.

What they said in Tuesday’s clubhouse

• Bellinger: “There’s always a certain point where it’s not necessarily going your way and feel it. You kind of feel this extra pressure to get the job done. At the end of the day, it’s the same game, and we have good conversations. We’re gonna have good conversations, we’re gonna keep going and gonna keep playing for each other, and get out of this thing.”

• Boone: “We are one of the best offenses in the league and have had a tough few days. I felt maybe pressing a little bit. Hendricks, I thought, was good, kind of rocking us back and forth. I thought he had a really good presence on both sides. But, maybe feeling like, ‘Hey, (we) got to get something going, and we got to let it happen. We got to go up and just really focus on having quality at-bats, and that will happen. We’ll get there, and hopefully (Wednesday’s) that day.”

June 18: Angels 3, Yankees 2

➤ Wednesday wasn’t that day as they mustered three hits. Three measly hits against starter Jack Kochanowicz and five relievers whose best ERA by the end of the night was 4.45. Honestly, by this point I’ve run out of ways to describe just how awful the past week has been so the win Thursday was certainly helpful to me.

➤ Hey, at least two of the hits were home runs, one by Chisholm which snapped the 30-inning scoreless drought, and then by Bellinger which gave the Yankees their first lead since last Thursday. Of course, that lead lasted about five minutes, but let’s not quibble, right?

➤ Ryan Yarbrough was fine. He gave up a solo homer to Schanuel on his third pitch of the game, and then to Jo Adell in the fifth which tied it at 2-2. Otherwise, like all of the starters in this gruesome stretch, he did a good enough job to win the game allowing just five hits and one walk in 5.1 innings.

➤ But he, nor the Yankees, won because of what happened in the disastrous eighth inning which was the perfect microcosm of the losing streak. In the top half, tie score and Cruz - who had escaped a Mark Leiter-created jam in the seventh - lost the plate with three walks and Boone finally woke up and yanked him. Tim Hill came in and induced exactly what he needed, an easy ground ball to short for an inning-ending double play. Instead, Volpe bobbled it, then in a panic he threw wide of second and everyone was safe as the winning run scored. Hill then kept it there by getting the final two outs but seriously, did it really matter? Of course not because the Yankees couldn’t get that run back.

➤ In the bottom half of the eighth Dominguez walked and Wells was hit by a pitch with no outs, but Grisham failed to get a bunt down and then popped out, and Judge and Bellinger did nothing, so there went another opportunity. And then in the ninth, Goldschmidt was gifted a base thanks to a throwing error, but Chisholm, JC Escarra and Volpe went down against ancient closer Kenley Jansen. On the last pitch of the game, Jansen threw an absolute middle-middle meatball and Volpe swung and missed by six inches. It was a pitch begging to be hit, and he looked ridiculous swinging through it.

➤ The Yankees made one interesting lineup decision, one that we saw coming. Rice started at catcher, a sign that this is how they might try to utilize him now that Stanton is back. Then again, Rice has been as useless as everyone else lately. His last home run was June 1 and in 14 games this month he’s hitting .149 with three RBI.

What they said in Wednesday’s clubhouse

• Volpe on his error: “Right off the bat, I’ve gotta be aggressive. Go get the ball and make the play. As far as that, that’s all it is. It’s the first read off the bat. I messed up. You take what you can from it, the good and the bad, and tomorrow’s a new day.”

• Boone on the error: “When we’re not scoring a lot of runs, you’ve got to execute at the highest level on little things. And we haven’t done that this week.”

• Judge: “I think you guys asked us the same questions last June when we were going through it. Guys have been there. You always gotta show up and not mope about it. If you mope, you pout, it's going to lead into the next game.”

June 19: Yankees 7, Angels 3

➤ Hooray. They won as they matched their run total from the previous seven games. Grisham and Goldschmidt homered early, then there were four innings of nothingness and it was getting to the point where it felt like they were going to find a way to blow another, but they came up with three important tack-on runs to pull away from a 4-3 lead.

➤ I’ve been in the camp of enough is enough with Grisham who hadn’t hit a homer since May 30 and whose average has been sinking like a stone. I think he should be back in the fourth outfielder role, but he had a productive day with the go-ahead homer in the second and then a double and a run scored in the seventh that made it 5-3. It was also nice to see Goldschmidt do something. After Mike Trout’s homer in the first, Goldy drilled a leadoff double and scored the tying run in the bottom half on Stanton’s fielders’ choice. And then he went back-to-back with Grisham in the second to make it 4-2.

➤ It was also nice to see Judge hit that late double, but he still looks lost and he’s now 4-for-31 in his last nine games. Let’s hope that hit turns him around because as we’ve seen, this team usually goes how he goes and where they went this week was to hell.

➤ Carlos Rodon battled on a day when he didn’t have his fastball, nor did he have great command. He made it through six innings and allowed only four hits - the problem is three of those were solo homers. After he left, the bullpen was excellent as Leiter, Loaisiga and Williams shut it down with Williams striking out the side in the ninth.

➤ There was another ridiculous baserunning gaffe. In a 4-3 game in the sixth, Wells was on first and Volpe was on second and it was two outs and a 3-2 pitch on its way to LeMahieu. Yes, the runners always go, but Wells left too early so Angels starter Tyler Anderson threw behind him. With Wells heading to second, Volpe had to try to advance and he was eventually retired in a rundown. It’s a damn good thing that didn’t come back to haunt the Yankees.

➤ Reliever Yerry De los Santos had to go on the injured list, so they called up a minor leaguer for the day, but now it’s possible Luke Weaver could return this weekend, way earlier than expected. If so, he’ll take the open roster spot.

What they said in Thursday’s clubhouse

• Bellinger: “Definitely feels good hearing the music again (in the clubhouse). Obviously, we were very frustrated with the past few games. Ultimately, we broke through in a pretty good way.”

• Rodon: “I thought [the offense] swung it great. They gave me a cushion to work with, and it was just enough. Three solo shots; I want to be in a better place with those pitches, so there’s stuff to work on this week. But all in all, we won the game. I thought we played some good baseball, and big props to the bullpen for shutting it down when we got up.”

• Grisham: “This game, over 180 days, will beat you up. I don’t think you really understand it until you get to this level. But when you get to a team like this, with a bunch of veteran guys around, seeing the way they lead and the way they’re consistent day in and day out - it rubs off on guys.”

The Orioles are in town and my son Holden and I will be going to the Sunday morning game. Being that we’re going to have to endure stifling temperatures in the low 90s, hopefully the trip will be worthwhile and we see a win, but in reality, the Yankees better win more than one in this series.

Here are some of the Orioles top players to watch:

➤ SS Gunnar Henderson: After a slow start he’s heating up and how has eight homers and a .790 OPS.

➤ DH Ryan O’Hearn: The most consistent threat all season hitting .301 with 10 homers and a team-high .862 OPS.

➤ 2B Jackson Holliday: Slowly but surely the top prospect is figuring things out and he’s now hitting .253 with 11 doubles and eight homers.

➤ C Adley Rutschman: He is also starting to work back from a terrible period that began midway through last season but his OPS is only .691.

➤ RP Felix Bautista: On of the best closers in MLB has saved 15 games in 16 opportunities with a .146 batting average against.

The pitching matchups are scheduled to be:

• Friday, 7:05, YES: Max Fried (1.89 ERA) vs. Tomoyuki Sugano (3.38), the 35-year-old Japanese rookie who has been Baltimore’s best starter and who dominated the Yankees on with five scoreless innings on April 28.

• Saturday, 1:05, YES: Clarke Schmidt (3.16) vs. Zach Eflin (4.81) who the Yankees did not see in that first series, and who is supposed to be their ace but hasn’t been.

• Sunday, 11:35, YES: Will Warren (4.83) vs. Dean Kremer (4.80) whose last outing was a solid five innings where he beat the red-hot Rays on Tuesday.