Yankees 2, Angels 5: Bats go cold as Schmidt struggles again

You don’t have to do the most in-depth analysis possible to figure out what went wrong for the Yankees in this game. The Angels took advantage of their chances when they got them, and the Yankees didn’t.

Over the course of the game, the Yankees drew seven walks, including six against Angels starter José Suarez. They had four hits as well, but not enough of them came at opportune times to take advantage of all the walks.

Meanwhile, the Angels picked up some runs off Yankees’ starter Clarke Schmidt. In just 3.2 innings, the right-hander allowed four runs on six hits in another less-than-stellar start from him. The difference in how the teams took advantage of an iffy start was decisive, and allowed the Angels to come away with a 5-2 victory.

It did not take long for the Angels’ stars to strike against Schimdt. After Taylor Ward started the game with a double, Shohei Ohtani crushed a homer into the Yankees’ bullpen to make it 2-0, Halos.

It could’ve gotten worse as Mike Trout immediately followed that with a single, but he ran himself into an inning-ending double play on a popup to Anthony Rizzo a few batters later.

Schmidt seemed to settle down a bit after that, but the Angels got to him again in the fourth. Trout led off the inning with a double and then scored on Anthony Rendon’s single. Hunter Renfroe added a double of his own to tack on yet another run. After hitting Zach Neto with a pitch later in the inning — which may have actually come off the bat, but wasn’t overturned on review — Schmidt would be removed from the game. Greg Weissert replaced him and eventually got out of the inning.

The Yankees eventually got on the board in the bottom of the fourth. Suarez had been struggled with control all night, and loaded the bases with walks to Oswald Peraza and Aaron Hicks, which sandwiched a Kyle Higashioka single. The walks were Suarez’s fifth and sixth of the night, and saw him exit the game. LA turned to Andrew Wantz, but he issued a walk himself, plating a run after a free pass to Anthony Volpe. There was just one out with Aaron Judge at the plate, and he narrowly missed a homer. His fly ball died in deep left field, which was enough for a run to tag up and score.

However, the Angels immediately got one of those runs back. Ohtani reached base to start the inning thanks to a catcher’s interference on Higashioka. Two batters later, Ohtani attempted to steal second and Higashioka’s throw skipped into the outfield when Oswald Peraza couldn’t corral the short hop, allowing Ohtani to advance another base. Two batters later, reliever Ron Marinaccio got Rendon to hit a fly ball for the second out of the inning, but Ohtani was able to score on the play.

Meanwhile after the two-run fourth, the Yankees’ bats went cold. Only one other Yankee batter reached base after that, and it came on a Peraza infield single when there were already two outs in the eighth. In the ninth, the lone glimmer of hope came when Kyle Higashioka seemingly made decent contact on a pitch, but that hung up in the air long enough to be caught for an out.

The Yankees still haven’t lost a series this season, but they’re going to have to do things the hard way to keep that streak alive thanks to a cold Tuesday night. Jhony Brito will be looking for a rebound as well tomorrow night when he takes the ball against Angels right-hander Griffin Canning with first pitch at 7:05pm ET.

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