With the Blue Jays already in possession of a 1-0 lead, Justin Turner produced a perfect symbol for the Yankees’ recent performance when he nubbed a soft groundball off the end of his bat in the first inning of Thursday’s game.
As the ball went straight down the foul line, Ben Rice — still inexperienced at first base — watched it roll. He hoped it would go foul, but it never did. Instead, it bounced off the first base bag, resulting in a run scored and no outs recorded.
Carlos Rodón didn’t appear happy with Rice after the play, but the starter had no one but himself to blame for the Yankees’ fourth straight loss, a 9-2 defeat in Toronto. While Rice made a rookie mistake on that one play, the veteran Rodón surrendered five runs before getting an out.
Prior to Turner’s dribbler, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. started the scoring with an RBI double. George Springer crushed a three-run homer after Turner’s single.
A Yankee killer throughout his career, Springer added another dinger in the second inning. Once again, it was a three-run jack, which gave Toronto an 8-0 lead.
Both homers came on fastballs, a problematic pitch for Rodón over his last three starts.
The lefty did not allow another run after that, and he even completed five innings after talking Aaron Boone out of a pitching change with one out in the fifth. The desire to fight for a few more batters was well received when Rodón entered the Yankees’ dugout, but that didn’t erase his 10-hit, eight-run outing.
Rodón also totaled one walk, eight strikeouts and 107 pitches. He now has a 4.42 ERA.
That number was under 3.00 when Rodón first took the mound at Fenway Park on June 15, but the Red Sox tagged him for five runs over five frames that day. Then the Braves jumped on Rodón’s fastball on June 21, tallying 11 hits and eight runs (seven earned) before booting him after 3.2 innings.
According to Stathead’s Katie Sharp, Rodón is just the fifth Yankee to allow 21 runs or more over a three-game stretch over the last 40 years.
Guerrero added a solo homer off of Phil Bickford in the sixth.
Faced with a deep, early hole, the Yankees didn’t do much on offense.
Trent Grisham did hit a two-run homer in the fifth, but José Berríos was otherwise sharp. The right-hander logged seven innings, two hits, two earned runs, three walks and eight strikeouts.
The Yankees have now lost four straight contests. They have fallen out of first place in the American League East standings. With three games to go in Toronto, they’ll look to avoid their fifth straight series loss.
Marcus Stroman will try to get the Yankees back in the win column when he starts against his former team on Friday. Yusei Kikuchi will start for Toronto.
