Yankees drop second straight, fall 6-2 to Athletics

Source: FanGraphs

Sometimes you just get beat, and the Yankees just got beat by the Athletics on Friday night. Sonny Gray shut New York’s offense down for eight innings and sent the Yankees to their second straight loss, this one by the score of 6-2. West Coast night games get bullet point recaps, so let’s get to it:

• Hang Around: Give Chris Capuano some credit, he could have been out of this game in the third inning, but he managed to hang around and soak up some innings without letting the A’s tack on more runs. The four-run third was partly the result of a ground ball threw Chase Headley’s legs — it was a potential double play ball and could have limited the damage to a run or two — and Capuano was able to retire nine of the final ten men he faced to get the ball into the sixth inning. (The one base-runner was an infield single.) It was no doubt a bad start, Capuano’s third in three starts, but at least he was able to give some length. Not a total loss.
• Four In A Row: The Yankees scored their first run on their first hit — Brian McCann hit a solo home run leading off the fifth. He’s gone deep in four straight games now. The last Yankee to do that was (who else?) Alex Rodriguez, back in 2009. They scored their second run in the sixth when Brett Gardner drove in Didi Gregorius with a ground out. Didi doubled and scooted to third on a wild pitch. The Yankees did bring the tying run to the plate in the seventh and eighth — they had the go-ahead run at the plate in the eighth! — but no luck.
• Leftovers: Headley made another error on the ball through his legs and Gregorius made what should have been an error on was instead called a base hit. He made a nice backhand stop then fumbled the transfer hilariously. Remember when defense was supposed to be a strength? … for some reason Stephen Drew was allowed to bat with two on and two outs in the ninth while pinch-hitter Mark Teixeira stood on deck (wtf!?!?) … Esmil Rogers allowed that Gregorius-aided hit to the first man he faced, then retired the next five, three on strikeouts … Jacob Lindgren allowed a two-run homer to Brett Lawrie on a pitch that wasn’t even in the zone to put the game out of reach in the eighth.

Here’s the box score, video highlights, updated standings, Bullpen Workload page, and Announcer Standings page. Nathan Eovaldi and Jesse Hahn will be the pitching matchup in the third game of the series on Saturday night. Yes, the ultra-dreaded Saturday night game on the West Coast. The worst.