The Yankees suffered their most lopsided loss of the season and it came in the most important game of the season to date.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The Yankees couldn’t have been set up better for their three-game series at home against the Orioles. They had Monday completely off. Their elite relievers were well rested after having not been needed on Saturday and Sunday in two losses against the Red Sox. They had the advantage in every starting pitching matchup with Nestor Cortes and his 1.57 ERA going against journeyman Albert Suarez (who hadn’t pitched in the majors in seven years before this season), Gerrit Cole making his season debut against Cade Povich in his third career start and American League Cy Young favorite Luis Gil against Cole Irvin and his weak 6.5 strikeouts per nine innings. The Yankees wasted all of their advantages and lost two of three to their direct competition for the division.

2. The Yankees held on to win the series opener 4-2, were managed to a 7-6 extra-inning loss in the middle game and then were humiliated in a 17-5 loss in the rubber game.

“They are a good club. We saw that last year,” Aaron Judge said. “They play hard. They play fast.”

3. Gil picked a bad day to have the worst start of his career (1.1 IP, 8 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 1 HR). After dominating the Orioles in Baltimore on May 1, Gil couldn’t get out of the second inning on Thursday and provided the Yankees with their first start of less than four innings of the season.

“It happens. That’s baseball,” Judge said. “You are going to have those outings like that.”

4. Gil had been so good overall before being embarrassed by the Orioles, but his disastrous start was kind of foreshadowed in his previous two starts. Two starts ago, the Dodgers tagged Gil for the most runs he allowed since April and it was the first time since April he didn’t complete six innings. Then in his last start, he gave the Yankees five innings of one-run ball, but walked four and put eight on in a grind-it-out effort.

5. The Orioles didn’t sit back and let Gil get ahead to blow them away with his riding fastball or low-‘90s changeup. They swung early in the count and attacked Gil before he could attack them. Gil faced 15 batters and 11 of them reached base.

“Today I missed pitches,” Gil said. “They took advantage of it, but it’s definitely a learning experience.”

6. The inconsistent Yankees offense can’t be trusted, but they have never had a chance on Thursday, considering they trailed 7-0 in the top of the second. Every Orioles starter had a hit in the game. The 4 through 7 hitters each had two hits and the 1 through 3 hitters each had three. The Orioles’ 17 runs were the most against the Yankees in five years.

“They came out swinging early on,” Judge said. “We really couldn’t answer back after that.”

7. Gleyber Torres hit his seventh home run of the season, a meaningless solo shot with the Yankees down seven, and Judge hit his league-leading 27th home run. (I’m glad Judge was healthy enough in the Yankees’ eyes to play on Thursday and hit a home run, but couldn’t have pinch hit 19 hours earlier in a game the Yankees could have won.)

8. The defense was sloppy with three errors, and the bullpen gave up 10 runs in 7 2/3 innings. Newest Yankee Tim Hill showed why the White Sox gave up on him as he allowed a three-run home run in his only inning of work. Caleb Ferguson and Victor Gonzalez provided their latest examples of why the Dodgers were willing to trade them, and Ron Marinaccio, who was good enough to relieve Cole in a tie game the previous day, is no longer good enough to be a Yankee and was sent down after the 12-run loss.

9. The Yankees are 6-7 in their last 13 games, dating back to the first game of the Dodgers series. They are 2-5 against the Orioles with six games left against them (and will need to win five of six to hold the head-to-head tiebreaker over them). They are 10-12 against the AL East. Their issues have been glaring over the last two weeks: lack of lineup depth, untrustworthy bullpen, a starting catcher who can’t throw, a pitching staff that can’t hold runners and a manager who continues to be a liability in close games.

10. It’s not going to get any easier. The Yankees were fortunate to get the Orioles’ worst three starters over the last three days, and now they will unfortunately get the Braves’ best three starters over the next three days: Chris Sale, Charlie Morton and Max Fried. The Braves have been playing much better of late (6-1 in their last seven games) after their slide following Ronald Acuna’s season-ending injury. They aren’t playing the way they played for all of last season, but the ability to is still in there (minus Acuna) and they are showing it. The next three days at the Stadium will be another tough three days.

The Yankees lost to the Orioles 7-6 in 10 innings in a game they had many opportunities to win.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Aaron Boone has managed 946 regular-season games for Yankees and Wednesday night against the Orioles was the worst of them all. (Emphasis on regular season since no regular-season game can top Game 3 of the 2018 ALDS or Game 4 of the 2018 ALDS or Game 2 of the 2019 ALCS or Game 2 of the 2020 ALDS or Game 1 of the 2022 ALCS.)

Every single decision Boone made on Wednesday was the wrong one. Every time a new player or pitcher was inserted into the game it put the team in a worse position to win the game, which is odd, considering Boone’s sole purpose as manager is to put his players in the best possible position to succeed.

2. Boone’s egregious decision making on Wednesday began before the game even started. It began when he held Aaron Judge out of the lineup. It was reported Judge wanted to play in the game, and he was still held out. Judge doesn’t have a broken hand. He doesn’t have ligament or muscle damage. If he did, he would be on the injured list. (Then again, it was said Anthony Rizzo would be out four to six weeks and then he was placed on the 60-day IL.) Judge was held out because the Yankees wanted to be “cautious.” Cautious of what? It’s not as if Judge’s hand is on the brink of breaking and playing baseball on Wednesday would have pushed his hand over the edge to breaking. His hand hurts. It’s going to hurt for some time. If he can play with it hurting (which he apparently can since he wanted to play) then he should be playing. He didn’t. (I’m sure he will be playing on Thursday afternoon with his hand magically healed 17 hours after Wednesday’s loss ended.)

3. Gerrit Cole made his season debut. In his last rehab start he threw 70 pitches, so going off of standard pitch count build-up history, he would be in line to throw about 85 pitches on Wednesday. Boone wanted to pull Cole after four innings and 61 pitches despite that being less pitches than he had thrown in his last start, and despite the Orioles’ 7-8-9 hitters due up, but YES showed Cole tell Boone in the dugout he wanted “one more.”

He got one more batter. Cole allowed a first-pitch single to start the fifth and Boone pulled him. Cole had only thrown 62 pitches or eight fewer than his most recent start. I don’t know how that’s building up his pitch count.

“We weren’t going to go over 65 tonight with the jump up,” Boone said.

The “jump up” from 70 to 65? Umm, 65 is less than 70.

“I thought he got a little tired there in the fourth,” Boone said of Cole.

Cole had a 1-2-3 fourth and struck out the last two batters of that inning. He had struck out five of the last seven batters he faced through the fourth. He wasn’t tired.

“I thought I held up well, Cole said. “I felt I could definitely keep making pitches.”

If Cole can’t be trusted to pitch to Ramon Urias and Jorge Mateo after 62 pitches then what was he doing starting a game of this magnitude? The Orioles are the Yankees’ only competition for the division. Each of their 13 head-to-head games is immensely important and Boone managed it as if it was a throwaway game in the final week of September with the division clinched.

4. If the plan was for Cole to get through four or five innings and then piece together the final 12 to 15 outs with the best relievers on the team, that would have been one thing. But when Boone took the ball from Cole with the game tied at 1 in the fifth, the first reliever he went to was Ron Marinaccio, the same reliever who wasn’t good enough to be on the team over Dennis Santana this season, and wasn’t on the team until the Yankees finally gave up on Santana and his 6.26 ERA. Because of the three-batter rule, unless everything went right and Marinaccio got a double play in the inning, he was going to have to face Gunnar Henderson. Boone was willing to let a reliever the organization liked less than Santana all season face the Henderson. Everything didn’t go right. Marinaccio needed 27 pitches to get the three outs in the fifth, allowed his inherited runner to score and gave up two runs of his own on a home run, double, single and walk.

5. In the sixth, the Yankees trailed 4-1. With two outs and no one on, the Orioles went to the bullpen for lefty Cionel Perez. DJ LeMahieu singled, Ben Rice and Jose Trevino walked and the Yankees had the bases loaded with two outs and Trent Grisham up. Grisham hits lefties better than righties. He’s not exactly Aaron Judge against lefties, but there’s great disparity in his numbers between the two. He’s a reverse-splits guy. We know this because Boone cited Grisham’s reverse splits as a reason for allowing Grisham to hit (and fail) against a lefty reliever earlier in the season. Apparently, the splits were no longer good enough for Boone to use in his decision making, like a Blackjack player hitting on 12 with the dealer showing a 6 sometimes, but not all the time. Boone called Grisham back and went with Jahmai Jones.

Tuesday will be the halfway point of the season. Jones entered Wednesday (Game 76 of the season) with 16 plate appearances. Sixteen times he has faced live, in-game pitching in nearly three months. Why wouldn’t he be the guy you would want up with the bases loaded and two outs in a crucial game? After Perez walked the previous two batters and had yet to record an out, showing little command of any pitch, Jones chose to swing at the first pitch he saw and flew out to end the inning.

Tommy Kahnle came in in the seventh and gave the Orioles their fifth run since giving up runs is what Kahnle does best now. In his last five appearances, he has only recorded eight outs, allowed eight baserunners, three earned runs and all three of his inherited runners to score.

The Yankees trailed 5-1 in the bottom of the seventh, before rallying to pull within one after a three-run home run from Giancarlo Stanton.

In the bottom of the eighth, the Yankees still trailed 5-4. Rice led off with a single. Trevino was due up against the righty Bryan Baker. The spot called for Austin Wells, but Boone let Trevino hit for himself. Trevino hit the first pitch he saw into a double play. Pinch-hitter extraordinaire Jones ended the inning with a ground out to the catcher.

6. Down 5-4 headed to the ninth with shaky Orioles closer Craig Kimbrel looming and the top of the Yankees’ order due up, the Yankees had a real chance to tie or win the game in the bottom of the ninth if they could hold the deficit at one. Boone decided the best choice to hold that deficit would be recently called-up Anthony Misiewicz, the 29-year-old with a career 4.71 ERA in 114 2/3 innings. Misiewicz is so low on the organization relief depth chart that Jonathan Loaisiga had to go down for the year, Santana had to get released, Marinaccio called up and Nick Burdi and Ian Hamilton go on the IL for him to be given a chance. Misiewicz would be facing the 9-hitter and then the top of the Orioles lineup. Boone wasn’t just playing with fire, he was dousing himself in gasoline and holding lighter fluid-soaked rags while playing with it by going to Misiewicz.

Misiewicz loaded the bases, because of course he did. He miraculously got out of the inning unscathed when Alex Verdugo made a spectacular running catch on a ball Anthony Santander hit 395 feet with a 106.1 mph exit velocity. In using Misiewicz to hold the deficit and having him succeed, Boone had done the equivalent of drinking 17 beers and then driving home, but because he made it safely, he thinks he made the right choice.

7. In the bottom of the ninth, The Yankees came back to tie the game against Kimbrel, because as mentioned, Kimbrel sucks. Anthony Volpe led off the ninth with a double and Stanton singled him home. With Stanton on first, Boone replaced him with Wells as the pinch runner. So Wells could be used as a pinch runner, just not as a pinch hitter for Trevino in the eighth with the leadoff man on and a righty on the mound? Managerial masterclass.

8. In the 10th, Boone went to Clay Holmes with the automatic runner on second. Holmes has been very bad since May 20 (21 baserunners in 11 innings and only seven strikeouts), but Boone went to his closer with the score tied in extras at home. It’s now 23 baserunners in 12 innings with only seven strikeouts as Holmes allowed a single, a double and a pair of runs to score with some help from his awesome catcher Trevino. After the Red Sox stole nine bases off him on Sunday, the Orioles stole three bases off him in the first nine innings on Wednesday, and on their fourth attempt in the 10th, Trevino threw the ball into left field to allow a run to score.

Unless something gets dramatically fixed instantly, Trevino can’t catch another game. The Red Sox let the entire league see what the worst-ranked catching arm in the sport is incapable of when they went 9-for-10 in steals on Sunday and the Orioles followed that up by going 4-for-4 on Wednesday. It’s embarrassing, pathetic and not fitting of a major-league catcher. And it’s not going to end.

9. With the Yankees now down two runs in the bottom of the 10th, LeMahieu led off with a single to move automatic runner Gleyber Torres over to third. Runners on the corners with no outs. Rice hit a ball that needed a Santander diving catch to prevent from falling in, but Torres scored on the sacrifice fly to make it 7-6. The tying run was still on base in the form of Oswaldo Cabrera (who pinch ran for LeMahieu), but at the plate would be Trevino followed by Jones.

With Trevino at the plate, Boone chose to send Cabrera and his 13 career steals in three years. Cabrera was easily gunned down as the ball was waiting for him at second.

Trevino ended up walking, bringing up Jones as the game-winning run. Facing Dillon Tate, who only averages 5.8 strikeouts per nine innings, Tate had yet to strike out a batter in the inning and Jones would at least be able to put the ball in play against the righty. Or not. Jones struck out on three pitches. Game over.

“We could have grabbed that game,” Boone said.

Yeah, you could have if anyone else had been managing.

10. With the loss, the Yankees are now 1-5 in extra-inning games this season, the worst mark in the league. And with the loss, their division lead is back to just a 1 1/2 games as they are once again tied with the Orioles in the loss column.

Wednesday was a winnable game the Yankees lost thanks to their manager. There have been too many of those since the start of his tenure, but none in the regular season worse than this one.

The Yankees beat the Orioles 4-2 on Tuesday and avoided a potential disaster after Aaron Judge was hit by a pitch.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Nearly two weeks ago, while the Yankees were sweeping the season series from the Twins, all of the attention for Yankees fans turned to wondering why Juan Soto was removed from a game following a rain delay. It was later announced Soto had left with left forearm discomfort and would be sent for imaging and tests the following day. The next 18 hours were spent hoping and praying the tests would come back favorably for Soto and the Yankees. Without Soto, the 2024 Yankees would become the 2023 Yankees offensively. Thankfully, everything worked out and Soto only ended up missing three games with inflammation.

Similarly, the status of Aaron Judge’s left hand became the focal point of Tuesday’s immensely important game against the Orioles once the center fielder was removed from the game after being hit by a pitch. If Judge’s testing came back unfavorably, the offense would become a shell of itself, as it would without Soto. With the seven non-Soto and non-Judge hitters being inconsistent and unreliable, the Yankees can’t afford to lose either for an extended period of time. Thankfully, like Soto, Judge is fine.

2. “It’s a big relief,” Judge said. “Just being hit there before a couple of years ago and breaking my wrist, you never know what’s going to happen.”

Losing Judge for weeks or months would have put a damper on the Yankees’ 4-2 win, but everything worked out on the field and in the X-ray room.

“We just wanted to make sure to get it looked at,” Aaron Boone said of pulling Judge, “and see what we were dealing with.”

It doesn’t matter that Albert Suarez wasn’t trying to hit Judge, he still hit him. If you can’t pitch inside without hitting batters, don’t pitch inside.

3. “We all know that they didn’t try to hit Judge right there, but it’s a little frustrating,” Soto said. “It’s a little uncomfortable.”

It’s more than a little frustrating. It’s a lot frustrating. If Judge is forced to miss Wednesday’s game or Thursday’s game against the Orioles, the hit by pitch has enormous implications on the AL East and could be the difference between having to play in the best-of-3 wild-card round or having a bye to the best-of-5 ALDS.

4. “At the end of the day, we don’t take what happened lightly,” Alex Verdugo said. “But at the same time, I don’t believe it was intentional.”

Well, the Yankees do take it somewhat lightly since no Oriole was hit. Nestor Cortes threw inside to Gunnar Henderson, but didn’t hit him. If that was all the Yankees plan on doing in retaliation, that’s not enough. Whether or not Judge was hit on purpose, Henderson needs to be hit. That’s the way it goes. Henderson or Adley Rutschman. Take your pick. One of them needs to eat a fastball.

5. “I wouldn’t say I would expect anything to roll over,” Verdugo said. “But I do expect that there’s gonna be a little bit more edge.”

If any of these next two games gets out of hand, I do expect it to roll over. Unfortunately, four runs wasn’t enough of a lead on Tuesday to avenge Judge since the Yankees ended up needing every run they could get with Clay Holmes on the mound.

6. Holmes entered with the Yankees leading 4-0 in the ninth, allowed a leadoff single to Henderson and then promptly gave up a two-run home run to Anthony Santander. Holmes eventually got out of the inning, but not before making Yankees fans squirm again.

Since the disaster on May 20 against the Mariners (when Holmes entered with a 0.00 ERA on the season), he has allowed eight earned runs and 22 baserunners in 11 innings with only seven strikeouts. I can’t continue to stress enough how important it is the Yankees have a closer who doesn’t rely on balls in play to get outs.

Another reason for Holmes’ issues on Tuesday was another extended layoff. Holmes went four days between appearances last week against the Royals and lost the game in the ninth. Prior to Tuesday, he hadn’t pitched since that Royals game five days earlier and allowed two runs. Holmes needs to pitch somewhat consistently, save situation or not.

7. The Yankees’ offense had six hits in the game (just one extra-base hit), but did manage six walks (three from Soto). The Orioles’ offense only had one of their eight hits go for extra bases as well and had just one walk, against Michael Tonkin.

Tonkin’s role with the Yankees continues to grow in importance, and it seems that he has passed over both Tommy Kahnle and Ian Hamilton for Boone’s bullpen pecking order. Tonkin was given the seventh inning on Tuesday in a four-run game against the Yankees’ sole competition for the division title. There isn’t a person in the world who envisioned this for Tonkin when the Yankees picked him up off the scrap heap and inserted him into that April 26 game against the Brewers. From April 26 through the end of May, these are the games Tonkin pitched in as a Yankee:

April 26: Lost game in 11th with him on the mound
April 28: 10-run win
May 2: Five-run loss
May 7: Seven-run win
May 11: Five-run loss
May 19: Five-run win
May 22: Four-run win (would have been a six-run win, but he allowed two runs)
May 26: Three-run loss
May 30: Five-run win

Tonkin wasn’t allowed near a close game in his first month with the Yankees, and the only close game he appeared in was one he made close himself. But then everything changed for him on June 2 in San Francisco (the crazy ninth-inning comeback game) when he pitched two scoreless innings in that 7-5 win. Since that day, Tonkin’s stock has risen within the Yankees and based on Tuesday night, he’s going to be the guy bridging the gap from starter to Luke Weaver in close games, and he deserves it with his 0.00 ERA in 13 innings since May 22.

7. Ben Rice made his major-league debut and went 1-for-4 with a line-drive single. A nice debut for Rice, who was removed for defensive purposes in the eighth.

Rice is viewed as a kid getting his first call-up to the majors, and he is, but what’s crazy is Soto isn’t even four months older than him. I think people tend to forget how young Soto is because this is his sixth season in the majors. He’s 25! Give him $1 billion!

8. DJ LeMahieu will always be the man for his 2019 and 2020 seasons when he tried to single-handedly carry the Yankees at times when the rest of the names in the lineup were hurt or underperforming. I was all for re-signing LeMahieu because of this and because the Yankees’ lineup lacked depth prior to the 2021 season. (Aaron Hicks was the Opening Day 3-hitter.) But after season-ending injuries in 2021 and 2022 that cost him postseason play both years and then his ongoing injuries in 2023 and this year, it’s difficult to believe LeMahieu will ever be even a shell of his former self. He used to be the guy I wanted up most in big spots, and now he’s the guy I want up least. Every ball is hit on the ground, and he has yet to pick up an extra-base hit in 56 plate appearances.

He has only played in 16 games and deserves a longer leash than that, considering Gleyber Torres and Anthony Rizzo have endless leashes, but the early results are not good. I’m holding out hope that this is him shaking off the rust, but I fear it’s not.

9. Nestor Cortes was awesome (6 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 6 K), but it was to be expected with him pitching at home. Cortes now has a 1.57 ERA and 0.818 WHIP in eight home starts and a 5.57 ERA and 1.452 WHIP in eight road starts.

Because of this, if the postseason started today and Gerrit Cole is his normal, healthy self the rest of the season, I would go Cole in Game 1, Cortes in Game 2 and Luis Gil in Game 3, and then pray for rain between Games 3 and 4 to get Cole back on the mound on normal rest in Game 4 to keep Carlos Rodon and Marcus Stroman away.

10. Cole will make his 2024 debut on Wednesday night against the Orioles. He’s not completely stretched out, so he’s likely to only give the Yankees four or five innings, unless he’s extremely economical (which he tends to not always be). His return comes at the perfect time with the Orioles on the schedule and Cody Poteet headed to the injured list.

After Tuesday’s win, the Yankees’ division lead is back up to 2 1/2 games. If the Yankees can win behind Cole’s debut on Wednesday then Luis Gil goes in the series finale on Thursday. This series with its pitching matchups heavily favoring the Yankees is set up for the Yankees to create some real separation in the standings. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but it’s hard not to, especially if Judge is in the lineup.

After winning the first game of the three-game series at Fenway Park, the Yankees dropped the next two and were humiliated along the way.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. I was sitting down the first-base line at Fenway Park on Apr. 26, 2009 for Sunday Night Baseball. Andy Pettitte was on the mound and trying to end the Red Sox’ early-season dominance over the Yankees, but he couldn’t.

With the game tied at 1 in the fifth, he allowed a two-double to David Ortiz, which scored Jason Varitek and moved Jacoby Ellsbury to third. After intentionally walking Kevin Youkilis, J.D. Drew came to the plate with runners on the corners. With a 1-1 count on Drew, Pettitte came set on the mound and as he stared at Youkilis at first base, Ellsbury took off. With Pettitte’s back to Ellsbury, he couldn’t see him running for home and by the time Jorge Posada realized what was happening to alert Pettitte, Ellsbury was too far down the line. Ellsbury stole home to give the Red Sox a 3-1 lead. He popped up, clenched his fists in celebration and made his way to the dugout where Terry Francona was laughing. (The Red Sox would win eight straight games against the Yankees to open the year.) The Yankees got the last laugh that season when they went on their own run against their rival, won the division and won the World Series. But that night at Fenway Park was demoralizing. I had seen (and have since) a lot of awful Yankees moments at Fenway Park, and the Ellsbury steal of home remains up there.

Yes, things are much different now than they were 15 Aprils ago: the Yankees have the best record in baseball and are 12 games ahead of the Red Sox in the division. But the level of embarrassment of watching the Red Sox steal nine bases in a single game against the Yankees is every bit as bad as it was when Francona put his arm around Ellsbury and the two shared a laugh at the Yankees’ expense.

2. “I think it’s matchup-dictated,” Aaron Boone said of allowing nine steals. “They had the right matchups out there on the field, and they took advantage of it.”

What matchup? The Yankees used six different pitchers in the game and the Red Sox stole off three of them (Marcus Stroman, Ian Hamilton and Luke Weaver). They couldn’t steal against Tommy Kahnle because he pitched a perfect inning, they didn’t need to steal against Caleb Ferguson because he was busy giving up hits all over the place and there wasn’t enough time to steal off Michael Tonkin. So the matchup is the entire Yankees’ pitching staff and Jose Trevino? Every team in the league watched the Red Sox run wild on the Yankees, and they will all now being doing it.

3. “That was good baseball tonight,” Alex Cora said. “Expect that from us. We’re going to push the envelope.”

Ken Rosenthal reported this week that if the Yankees were to suffer an early postseason exit or not reach the World Series that they would possibly replace Boone with Cora. If failing to meet expectations the last six years, culminating in the worst Yankees season in 30 years last year wasn’t enough for Boone to be fired, he’s not going anywhere if the Yankees simply reach the postseason (which is all they truly care to do). But even with an injury-riddled, mediocre roster that has Rob Refsnyder batting second, Dominic Smith as a middle-of-the-order bat and a center fielder playing shortstop, Cora still managed to manage circles around his counterpart yet again.

4. The nine steals against the Yankees served as the latest embarrassing accomplishment for the Yankees under Boone. Here’s some highlights on his managerial resume:

• First Yankees manager to get a fifth season without having won a championship (and now a sixth and seventh season too)
• Oversaw most lopsided home postseason loss in franchise history (Game 3 of the 2018 ALDS)
• Managed the Yankees to their worst full-season record in last 30 years in 2023
• Managed the Yankees to their worst month record-wise in 31 years in 2021
• Most steals allowed in a game by the franchise in 109 years

Boone wasn’t needed in Friday’s 8-1 Yankees rout and there was nothing he could on Saturday thanks to the $162 million man. But on Sunday, after the Yankees had turned a late three-run deficit into a one-run deficit, the Yankees needed their manager to put the team in the best possible position to succeed over the final two-plus innings and he couldn’t.

With the Yankees trailing 4-3 entering the bottom of the seventh, Boone’s elite relievers were rested in Weaver and Clay Holmes, having yet to pitch in the series, and with a day off scheduled for Monday, he could afford to use them in a game the Yankees were currently losing. Instead, Boone went to Caleb Ferguson for the seventh, and after Ferguson faced the minimum three batters, the Red Sox had runners on the corners with one out, threatening to add to their one-run lead.

The seventh inning screamed Luke Weaver’s name, with the righty having pitched just twice in the last seven days, but Boone figured he could try to steal an inning with Ferguson and then go to Weaver in the eighth. The plan backfired and Boone ended up calling on Weaver to clean up Ferguson’s mess. If Boone was willing to use Weaver in the game and willing to use him in that inning, why not just give Weaver a clean inning to start with? That exact situation has now been played out countless times per season for six-plus years under Boone.

5. The loss on Sunday wouldn’t have hurt so bad if Carlos Rodon showed up on Saturday. But he didn’t. A national TV game in a hostile environment against a divisional rival? It was foolish for anyone to think Rodon would be anything other than the worst version of himself.

Rodon needed 109 pitches to get through five innings and allowed five earned runs and 10 baserunners.

“It just looked like he was in the heart of the plate a lot,” Boone said. “I thought his stuff was good.”

Boone has yet to see a starting pitching performance in six-plus years in which his starter didn’t have “good stuff.” I don’t know how he can say Rodon “was in the heart of the plate a lot” and then in his next breath say he “thought his stuff was good.”

Rodon has now struggled against the Red Sox (5 IP, 7 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 3 BB, 7 K), Orioles (4 IP, 8 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, 3 HR) and Blue Jays (4 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 4 BB, 5 K). Guess who the Yankees play the most games against each season? The Red Sox, Orioles and Blue Jays (and Rays who Rodon has yet to face this season).

If Rodon is healthy come October, he will undoubtedly get the ball for a playoff game because money owed is more important than performance or logic, and Rodon is owed a lot of money (he makes roughly $800,000 per start) and the Yankees’ postseason plans are rarely created with logic (like using an opener in Game 2 of the 2020 ALDS or having Clarke Schmidt be the first guy out of the bullpen. Game 1 of the 2022 ALCS or a million other examples during the Boone era). Rodon has only made one playoff start in his career (2021 ALDS Game 4) and he didn’t get through three innings (2.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 3 K). Saturday night was a postseason-like atmosphere, just like it was in May in Baltimore, and unsurprisingly Rodon’s two worst starts of the season came in those two games. Thankfully, he won’t get to face the Orioles this week.

6. Thankfully, Luis Gil will face the Orioles this week. Gil couldn’t command his fastball or changeup on Friday night and still gave the Yankees five innings of one-run ball to lead them to their only win of the series. He’s so good.

7. Gleyber Torres isn’t good. In fact, he sucks. He flat-out sucks. When he isn’t dropping pop-ups, booting grounders, getting picked off or rushing throws, he’s putting together disgusting and disturbing at-bats.

Torres went 0-for-Fenway over the weekend and reached base once via a walk in 12 plate appearances. Between Friday and Saturday, he left 11 runners on base, and yet, he was somehow worse on Sunday.

In the series finale, the Yankees trailed 4-3 in the seventh. They were able to load the bases with no outs and Torres coming to the plate. Torres got ahead 3-0 because new reliever Zack Kelly wasn’t even close on any of his first three pitches. Then Torres took back-to-back fastballs down the middle on 3-0 and 3-1 to run the count full. The Red Sox knew Torres would be swinging at the 3-2 pitch unless it hit him in the head, so Connor Wong called for a sweeper away, Kelly threw it away and in the dirt and Torres struck out swinging to add three more runners left on base to his weekend tally of 14.

If you like Torres, you don’t like the Yankees. How could you when his very presence in the field, on the bases and in the batter’s box is detrimental to the success of the team. Torres doesn’t hit for average (.222 batting average) or power (.333 slugging percentage). He doesn’t provide speed (four steals) and doesn’t get on base often (.298 on-base percentage). He’s a horrific defender (leads all second baseman in errors) and has the worst Baseball IQ of any player I have ever watched (Nick Swisher is off the hook). Torres is a losing player who provides no value to the team, and yet, he’s the only Yankee Boone has decided needs no days off.

8. The offense is so bad outside of Juan Soto and Aaron Judge that when the Yankees don’t score when the duo is up, you immediately start to count how many innings it will be until they may get up again. Because the rest of the lineup is so blah, being average or the slightest bit above average has fooled the perception of the production of hitters like Alex Verdugo, Anthony Volpe and Giancarlo Stanton.

It’s a good thing Alex Verdugo had a big night on Friday in his return to Fenway because he didn’t do anything for the rest of the series. Verdugo’s home run was his first in June, and the Yankees’ “cleanup hitter” is hitting .260/.313/.426.

7. I nicknamed Brett Gardner “The Streak” during his playing days because he was the streakiest player of all time. Well, it looks like the Yankees’ latest leadoff solution is ready to inherit that title. Here is Volpe’s season broken down into four parts:

March 28-April 14: .382/.477/1.041 (1.518 OPS)
April 15-May 5: .163/.247/.238 (.485 OPS)
May 7-June 5: .333/.368/.539 (.907 OPS)
June 6-16: .154/.154/.192 (.346 OPS)

He hasn’t walked in June., Volpe has one extra-base hit in June. He hasn’t walked in June. He has one home run since May 9.

8. Stanton leads the league in strikeouts and only has a .293 on-base percentage, but there’s nothing really to say about him. This (.776 OPS) is the best version of Stanton at this point, so he’s playing as well as he can play, unfortunately.

9. The Yankees need lineup depth. I thought they would get that in Jasson Dominguez, but now he’s on the injured list, so it’s back to hoping Verdugo can be better than he has been (unlikely since he has a 108 OPS+ and a 106 OPS+ for his career) and that Volpe can find some consistency. It’s back to praying some combination of Torres, Anthony Rizzo (if healthy) and DJ LeMahieu can hit even a little bit.

The rotation is fine and the bullpen is what it is until they either get healthier this summer or acquire help in the next six weeks.

The Yankees have the best record in baseball, but it doesn’t mean they don’t have glaring issues. Fortunately, their issues are masked a lot of games because they have the best two hitters in the world hitting back-to-back in their lineup. But the issues still exist. The Red Sox exposed the Yankees’ lineup with mediocre pitching, beat up a bullpen that has trouble generating strikeout and demoralized a staff that can’t hold runners on and a catcher with one of the weakest arms in the league at the position.

10. Don’t think the Orioles weren’t watching. The Yankees were an Oswaldo Cabrera two-run home run away from being swept in four games in Baltimore last month and over the next three days at the Stadium, the Yankees will try to avoid letting the Orioles overtake them in the division.

The Yankees are going to miss Kyle Bradish, Grayson Rodriguez and Corbin Burnes with Bradish now hurt and Rodriguez and Burnes having pitched on Saturday and Sunday. This is the most important series of the season to date and one of the four most important series of the season overall. If the Yankees play this week like they did over the weekend, the Orioles will be in first place.