COLD TIMERS’ DAY
Frigid Yanks lose 10th in last 12 as rally falls short
JOE Girardi and a few veterans mentioned the silver lining. That despite two weeks of atrocious play the Yankees remained tied atop the AL East with the Red Sox.
They have lost 10-of-12 and — in Mets-ian fashion — have a mounting injury list. On Sunday alone, Matt Holliday (allergic reaction that he can’t shake) and Starlin Castro (wrist) were unavailable to Girardi and Aaron Hicks was likely sidelined for at least a month with an oblique injury.
This left the Yankees offense shorthanded and the team in a position that no team really wants to be — needing to rely upon Michael Pineda.
And the truth is that is not just a Sunday thing. These Yanks need the best of Pineda. So there should not be surprise with the synchronicity between Pineda’s June swoon and that of the team.
In the finale of a 2-4 homestand, Pineda did enough damage in four innings to devalue five shutout relief innings by the Yankees and six unanswered runs by that shorthanded offense. There were other Yankees culprits in a 7-6 Texas triumph, including Girardi giving Chase Headley a green light to steal with the team down three runs in the sixth inning and Gary Sanchez being pegged out at third for the final out of the seventh. Sanchez represented the potential tying run and said he was running hard on Didi Gregorius’ RBI single, but if he was, he is even slower than I perceived.
But at least Sanchez brought positives. His three-run homer in the fifth provided the strongest push to get the Yanks back in this game.
Pineda offered nothing constructive. He lacked command, particularly of his key slider, and could not find the craft or fortitude to limit damage.
Pineda began this game having held hitters to a .136 average and .332 OPS when he began a count 0-2 and .124 with a . 299 OPS after 1-2.
Pineda opened the game by getting ahead of Delino DeShields 0-2 before the leadoff hitter doubled on a 2-2 pitch, initiating a three-run Texas first highlighted by an Adrian Beltre homer smashed on a fastball that Pineda was trying to dart low and away, and missed completely across the plate.
Pineda opened the second by getting ahead 0-2 again, this time on Jonathan Lucroy, who singled. Still, Pineda followed with two outs before walking DeShields after getting ahead 1-2. Shin-Soo Choo followed with a homer on a hanging 0-2 slider. For good measure, Pineda again got two outs in the fourth before yielding the first hit and homer of Drew Robinson’s career, and it was 7-0.
Girardi said he “didn’t want to make a bigger deal than it is” about Pineda’s poor pitching because the manager described it as “the first time” the righty did not do well in minimizing damage this year. But after the first two months, when he was 6-2 with a 3.32 ERA, Pineda has gone 1-2 in June with a 5.85 ERA and .316 average against.
This dichotomy played to who Pineda has been as a Yankee — the stuff is there to tease that consistent excellence is possible. But the track record is pretty well established that Pineda will not sustain that level. His constant is inconsistency.
And these Yankees really do need the best version of Pineda for 2017 if they hope to see more than just silver linings.
Luis Severino and Jordan Montgomery actually have been the Yankees’ best starters. But it should be remembered that they have never pitched a full major league season in a rotation, and that both probably have innings caps to which the Yanks will adhere.
That duo won the Nos. 4 and 5 jobs in spring with the Yanks hoping Masahiro Tanaka, CC Sabathia and Pineda could form a sturdy top three. Sabathia is on the DL, though getting closer to a return. Tanaka had a terrific start Friday and the Yanks want to believe again that is a sign — with him working up in the zone a little more with his fastball — that top-ofthe-rotation results will regularly follow.
And then there is Pineda, who Sunday became the first Yankees starter in 2017 not named Tanaka to allow three homers in a game. The skill is in there, but his June of bad start, good start, bad start, good start, bad start felt like a familiar one-step-forward, one-step-back pattern for him while in pinstripes.
The Yanks could conceivably try to upgrade the rotation by promoting Chance Adams or finding a trade. But that would mean counting on another youngster and/or unearthing an available quality rotation arm and being able to complete a trade for it when other contenders, notably the Astros, will be hunting the same species.
For now, the rotation you see is the rotation you get. Which means the Yanks remain in that most uncomfortable of positions — needing to depend on the undependable Michael Pineda.