Yankees 1, Mets 7: That’s what a .500 team does

The Yankees losing ugly games after their trade deadline fire sale was inevitable, and this was certainly one of those games. Masahiro Tanaka was victimized by the home run and the offense never got anything going against Jacob deGrom.

Tanaka actually cruised right out of the gate. Things started to fall apart, however, with a two-out walk to deGrom. Pitching out of the stretch for the first time in the game seemed to bother Tanaka and he responded by serving up a home run to Alejandro de Aza. Travis d’Arnaud added a solo shot in the fifth inning to make it 3-0.

It was the seventh inning when it all unraveled for Tanaka. The Mets pushed across four runs on two doubles, an infield single, and a blooper to right. It was 7-0 Mets with little hope for the Yankees’ hapless offense to respond. The team did record six hits in the game, but those hits did not turn into runs.

Didi Gregorius did finally put the Yankees on the board with a solo home run in the ninth inning. It was far too little, too late, but it’s nice to see Gregorius continue to be really good at the plate. Alex Rodriguez was given a chance to pinch hit in the ninth and flied out to end the game. Each of his appearances feels like it could be the last, especially with him not having any success. It’s sort of hard to watch after how well he did just a year ago, but Rodriguez himself seems to have come to peace with what seems inevitable.

Some help for the offense is already on the way, though. Gary Sanchez has been promoted and others should be joining him in the next few days. Even if they don’t find immediate success at the plate, just watching them should be more entertaining than what has been getting run out there on a daily basis to this point.

Tanaka finished the night charged with seven runs on eight hits in 6.1 innings of work. Richard Bleier and Anthony Swarzak closed out the game without allowing any further runs.

As a .500 team, the Yankees will likely lose as many games as they win, more or less. Sometimes they will find ways to win, like last night. Sometimes they will be nearly unwatchable, like tonight. That’s what you get with a .500 team. Guess we have to get used to it for at least the next couple of months.