Nothing can kill a winning streak like sloppy play, and that's exactly what happened to the Yankees on Thursday in their 6-3 loss to the Red Sox.
Not only did the Yankees pitching walk nine batters, they left 10 runners on base and made four errors — yes, four — that resulted in three runs and ultimately were the difference in this game.
"Not a real clean game for us. A lot of free bases there," manager Aaron Boone said of his team's performance after the loss. "For the most part in the first half, we were able to overcome them…they made us pay on the last error on the homer. Not a great night for us."
That homer Boone alluded to was the exclamation point on the tough night for the Yankees. First, Luis Gil had trouble with his command, walking five batters and making the first error of the game when he booted a chopper to him to lead the second inning. Jazz Chisholm Jr. followed up with a throwing error on a potential double play ball that allowed the runner to advance to second with one out. After a stolen base and a walk, Ben Rice made a throwing error trying to catch a runner stealing that gave the Red Sox an extra base and allowed the runner at third to score.
Three errors in one inning, but Gil and the Yankees kept it at just one run allowed.
Gil would allow Boston runners to clog the bases through his five innings of work, but allowed just two runs and was the pitcher of record on the winning side when he was done. The Yankees bullpen would walk four more batters and allow the Red Sox to capture the lead, 4-3, which held until the ninth inning.
It looked as if the Yankees were going to bat in the bottom of the ninth only down one, when the fourth and final error occurred. With one out, Yerry De Los Santos got a ground ball to first base, but Paul Goldschmidt could not get the ball out of his glove to make the flip to the pitcher covering. Two batters later, Roman Anthony blasted a towering two-run shot with two outs to give the Red Sox the insurance they needed, an at-bat that would have never occurred.
"Definitely gave them spots to win and I felt like tonight was one of those nights where we beat ourselves," Chisholm said after the game. "Just like [Cody Bellinger] said in the past, sometimes you just got to look at yourself in the mirror and say, 'Hey you beat yourself tonight. Tomorrow, come out better and focus more.'"
"You can’t fix every time you make errors, it’s going to be hard to overcome. It might have been the reason we lost tonight," Goldschmidt said. "There’s a lot of good teams in this league. Any time you give them an extra out, extra runs, they got two when I made my error in the ninth, it could have been a different game, I’m sure they probably scored another run off another error. You make it hard on yourself. We didn’t play good enough to win tonight."
Thursday was the third game in which the Yankees made four-plus errors in a single game this season. That's the most in MLB. Before Thursday's game, the last time the Yankees committed four-plus errors and walked nine-plus batters in a nine-inning game at home was May 1912 (h/t Katie Sharp).
Both Chisholm and Goldschmidt said they are not overly concerned with their errors moving forward when they were asked. Chisholm specifically pointed to the Gold Glovers in the infield and chalked Thursday's performance to "just baseball," but what should be concerning is the team's performance against the teams they are likely to face in the postseason.
After Thursday's loss, the Yankees are 6-17 against the Tigers, Blue Jays, Astros and Red Sox (5-1 against the Mariners) this season. Boston pulled within 0.5 games of the Yankees for the first wild card spot and improved their record against the Yankees to 6-1 this year.
Goldschmidt was asked about why Boston has had the Yankees' number this season and the former MVP could not think of a reason.
"I don’t have an answer. We played a lot of close games with them," he said. "They’ve been able to make one more play, one more hit than us. Hopefully, we can change that tomorrow."
The Yankees and Red Sox meet three more times this weekend before they meet in a three-game set in Boston in mid-September. There is still time to turn the narrative that Boston owns them this season, but it's getting late early.