This past week’s Subway Series turned into a slaughter as the New York Mets absolutely demolished the New York Yankees at Citi Field. Over the course of two games, the Mets outscored the Yankees 21-9 and jumped on both Yankee starters early in each game.
Game 1: Gerrit Cole vs. David Peterson
Game 1 saw Yankee ace and reigning AL Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole give up 6 ER over 4 IP in only his second start of the year. More concerning for Cole is the 4 home runs he gave up, which has been an issue for Cole his whole career but something he was able to control last season. Cole also, and for only the 2nd time in his career, did not record a single strikeout.
This is only Cole’s second start of the season. So there is room for patience and calm with him. However, given his first start against a far superior opponent in the Baltimore Orioles went better, it would seem Cole is trending in the wrong direction.
The Yankees found themselves down 9-1 before a couple of hits in the 7th and a Judge grand slam in the 8th brought the score to within 2. The bombers could not bring anyone else across the plate and would eventually drop the first game of the Subway Series 9-7.
Game 2: Luis Gil vs. Sean Manaea
Game 2 saw Yankee rookie phenom Luis Gil on the mound looking to bounce back from his worst start of the year. Against Baltimore, Gil had a 1.1 inning showing and gave up 7 earned runs.
Unfortunately, a bounce back performance would not come to fruition. Gil worked through the first 2 innings unscathed before giving up 3 runs in the third and another 2 in the fifth. Gil’s final line would be 4 1/3 IP, 4 Hits, 5 ER, 2 K and 4 BB.
Similar to Cole, there should be little cause for concern with Gil at the moment. He’s been absolutely dominant all year and two bad starts shouldn’t overshadow an otherwise solid start to the year.
However, the Yankees bullpen went on to give up another 7 ER and they lost Game 2 of the Subway Series 12-2. A mini 2-0 sweep for the Mets and an absolutely embarrassing showing by the Yankees in a series they really needed to win.
Besides Aaron Judge, the Yankees did absolutely nothing during this series that would make Yankee fans feel good about the future. It’s hard to ignore their dominant body of work up until the Red Sox series (49-21), but they’ve been as bad as one can imagine lately. As a matter of fact, Yankee hitters not named Aaron Judge have been atrocious over their last 11 games.
Yankees’ Recent Struggles
Since they left Kansas City, the Yankees are 3-9 and riding a 4 game losing streak after losing in Toronto last night 9-2. Not to mention Carlos Rodon got absolutely rocked for his third straight start, giving up 8 ER in the first two innings. Over his last 3 starts, Rodon has given up 20 ER in 13.1 IP, and his promising bounce back season has quickly derailed into what looks like a repeat of 2023.
With their recent struggles, the Yankees now find themselves out of first place for the first time since May 13th. The Yankees never led by more than 4 games, but the gap always seemed a lot wider the first few months of the season as they seemed to rarely lose. Now it seems like they rarely win.
At the end of the day, the Yankees are still 52-31 and have a 7 game lead as the first WC spot. They’re right in the thick of it and have a solid chance of competing with the Orioles for the division the rest of the year. Gerrit Cole will become Gerrit Cole again, Juan Soto is still Juan Soto, and injured guys will return.
Oh, and Aaron Judge is still the best goddamn baseball player on planet Earth. This current Yankee run is tough to watch, but the baseball season is long and come October a two week stretch in June will be far less talked about than it is now.
