Road woes keep haunting Pineda
TORONTO — Michael Pineda has made some great strides this season, but Friday night was an example of just how far the big right-hander still has to go before the Yankees truly can trust him.
Pineda gave up a season-high 10 hits and struck out one batter, his lowest strikeout total in nearly two years, over five messy innings in a 7-5 loss to the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre.
Pineda continues to struggle on the road. He is just 2-6 over his past 17 road starts and simply is not the same pitcher on the road that he is at Yankee Stadium.
Compounding all this, of course, are the struggles of supposed-ace Masahiro Tanaka, who is coming off a 10-4 loss to the Orioles. General manager Brian Cashman needs to go out and find one more starter if the Yankees want to make the most of their surprise start.
“His stuff wasn’t sharp, his location wasn’t good,’’ manager Joe Girardi said, summing up Pineda’s night.
Pineda wasn’t the only reason the Yankees lost, but he put them in the kind of first-inning hole that was difficult to climb out of as he surrendered a pair of long home runs.
The first was a solo blast to left by Josh Donaldson off a cementmixer slider. Then, after getting two outs and walking designated hitter Kendrys Morales, Pineda allowed a titanic home run to Justin Smoak on poorly located fastball, the blast smashing off the right-field facing above the second deck.
Before you knew it, the Yankees were down 3-0.
All the momentum the Yankees built with the 12-2 Thursday night victory was gone. Pineda simply didn’t have it on this night.
“My command tonight is not like it used to be, it happens sometimes,’’ Pineda said. “I don’t have my best stuff. They swing at everything.’’
The Yankees had their issues with runners in scoring position, a most familiar concern with this team through the years, and were down 5-0 after four innings. Yankees hitters could have bailed Pineda out with some clutch hits, but were 0-9 with RISP.
Pineda left after five innings having surrendered those 10 hits and five runs while walking three and recording just that one strikeout, the final batter he faced.
Over his past two starts, Pineda has walked six batters, as many as he had walked over his five pre- vious starts.
The Yankees climbed back to 5-4 on the strength of a mammoth opposite-field two-run home run by Aaron Judge and a two-run home run by Starlin Castro in the sixth.
Pineda has been able to find other ways to survive this season when he didn’t have his best stuff, but this was not the case as he dropped to 6-3.
Here is another problem for Pineda on the road: He has allowed two home runs in each of his past three road starts.
Again, Pineda has made strides this season, but this was a classic AL East game, a battle of wills, and the right-hander could not overcome his issues on the road. In seven career starts against the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre — a difficult park to pitch in because of the way the baseball flies, whether the roof is open or closed — Pineda is 1-4. On this night, the roof was open.
That first inning set a tone. The Yankees were not crisp and Chris Carter made a critical error in the seventh, failing to get to first base on a Smoak smash to Castro in short right field. It was that kind of night for the first-place Yankees, who dropped to 31-21 while the Blue Jays moved to one game under .500.
Luis Severino has become the Yankees’ best starter (4-2, 2.93). Pineda, meanwhile, saw his ERA jump from 3.32 to 3.76. Pineda had tied a career-high with five straight quality starts.
The Yankees are in a most difficult stretch of 13 games versus the AL East. In two of their past three games, started by Tanaka and Pineda, the Yankees have surrendered 17 runs.
That could be a sign of big trouble ahead for this rotation.