From Theo DeRosa:
The Yankees couldn’t make it a six-game winning streak.
But they sure made it interesting.
Down by five runs entering the ninth inning, the Yankees threatened to upend Saturday night’s game against the Athletics at Sutter Health Park when Ben Rice, Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger drew consecutive walks, all of which forced in runs, to cut the deficit to two and put the go-ahead run on board.
Finally, though, Jazz Chisholm Jr. grounded out to first base to end the threat and the Yankees’ 6-4 loss to the A’s at Sutter Health Park.
You really have to feel for Boone in the moment. With two outs in the seventh inning and no outs in a game that he had pitched pretty darn well in, Weathers had the leadoff hitter up. He was a righthanded hitter. Do you pull him for Camilo Doval there? Do you trust an exhausted Weathers there or Doval at ANY time? If Doval didn’t suck so much, you’d obviously use Doval there, but since you can’t trust him, what do you do? Leave Weathers in and let him try to get through seven, and let him also have a chance at a win? 3-1 deficit is not that crazy.
Boone gave him the batter, and a tired Weathers just couldn’t throw enough strikes, and walked the guy. Now a left-handed Kurtz was up. The Yankees have gotten the A’s slumping stars going, so this was a tough out here, but at the same time, Doval against him would be a terrible matchup, too. I’ll admit that in the moment, I said, “Fuck it, I’d take my chances with Weathers here, even if he probably SHOULD come out” (I literally was texting this with my brother, who has Weathers on his fantasy team. He wanted him pulled, even though it would ruin any chance he would have for a win for his fantasy team. He was more worried about ERA). And it did not work out, an exhausted Weathers was crushed by Kurtz for a two-run home run and the game was effectively over at 5-1 with just two innings left for the Yankees.
Admirably, they made a shocking comeback in the ninth, scoring three runs on three bases loaded walks and having the tying run on second base, but Jazz grounded out to end the game (boy, they really should probably have Goldy batting fifth going forward, right? Why would you want Jazz ahead of Goldy? Goldy at least always gives you professional at-bats. I don’t even hate Jazz or anything, but you probably want more at-bats for Goldy than for Jazz).
I am not too down on Weathers, but the Yankees had a chance at seven straight quality starts, and that home run broke the streak. Oh well, he honestly didn’t pitch too bad up until that home run, and he was clearly exhausted on that home run. So, again, hard to rip him too much.
This was more on the offense than anything, really. At least the Rays lost.
Featured image is that fateful home run.
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