HIT CHARADE
Bats go quiet again as Yanks fall to rays for 7th loss in 9 games
THE YANKEES’ offense isn’t producing and has the Bombers tumbling. Suddenly the AL East basement is looking pretty big in the window as the race at the bottom of the division has become as close as the one at the top.
The light-hitting “Bombers” are still in third place after managing just six hits in an 8-3 loss to Tampa Bay Thursday night before 37,649 at the Stadium. But the fourth-place Rays are 1½ games behind them with three more meetings
to go in this series. Last-place Toronto, meanwhile, is on an eight-game winning streak and is just 3½ games behind the Yanks.
The Yanks have lost seven of nine and have hit a meager .196 over that span. In those nine games, they have scored 27 runs, managed 61 hits and left 60 men on base.
Brett Gardner said that hitting can sometimes be contagious, but when asked if that sometimes can be true of slumping, he said: “It kind of seems like it right now. We haven’t been doing a real good job as an offense — of getting guys on base, situational hitting, scoring runs. We need to do better at that. It’s the same thing — after every loss we say the same thing.”
Added teammate Lyle Overbay: “When you struggle, you tend to press a little bit. It’s only human nature. T he biggest thing is getting good at-bats, and I don’t think we’ve done t hat consistent ly like we were. We’re swinging at their pitches and not ours.