NEW YORK — The bobblehead line moved faster than the Yankees’ bats. A sellout crowd of 41,203 filed into the Bronx on Thursday for George Costanza night, and for long stretches the giveaway was the liveliest thing in the building.
The Yankees had spent three days looking like the team their front office kept promising. They pounded out 24 runs and 34 hits across a productive stretch that began Monday. The lineup was balanced, patient and, for once, dangerous with two strikes.
Then the switch flipped off. Houston’s pitchers carved through the Yankees order with a mix of strikes and swing-and-miss, and New York kept walking back to the dugout with runners stuck in scoring position. By the middle innings, the tension had drained out of the ballpark and a familiar dread had settled in its place.
Gerrit Cole gave New York exactly the kind of start a contender needs down the stretch. He struck out five, walked one and kept the Astros scoreless into the sixth. It was not enough. The Yankees managed five hits, scored once and went hitless in nine chances with runners in scoring position in a 5-1 loss that cost them the series.
The pitcher who silenced them was one the Yankees drafted, developed and then decided they could live without. Hayden Wesneski, a sixth-round pick by New York in 2019, made his first career appearance at Yankee Stadium and looked entirely at home. He held the club that once owned his rights to one run over five-plus innings, striking out six and improving to 4-1.
Four years earlier, the Yankees traded Wesneski to the Chicago Cubs for reliever Scott Effross. On Thursday, that forgotten swap walked back into the Bronx and beat them. The loss dropped New York to 75-58 and framed a weekend that could shape October.
A prospect Yankees traded away silences them
Wesneski never threw a pitch for the Yankees at the major league level. He came up through their farm system after the 2019 draft, then went to Chicago at the 2022 deadline in the deal for Effross. The right-hander eventually landed in Houston, and Thursday marked his debut on the mound where his professional career began.
He allowed three hits and walked two before handing the game to the Astros’ bullpen. Josh Hader, Steven Okert and A.J. Blubaugh combined to finish it, and Houston pitchers piled up 11 strikeouts. The Yankees never put together the kind of inning that turns a close game.
Cole, who pitched for Houston in 2018 and 2019, was sharp for most of the night. He twice struck out Yordan Alvarez, who leads the American League in each Triple Crown category. The Yankees right-hander finished one strikeout short of tying Robin Roberts for 54th on the all-time list.
One pitch turns a close game
Houston scratched out a run in the third when Jeremy Pena raced home from first on Isaac Paredes’ single into the right-field corner. The game stayed within reach until the sixth, when Cole lost a long at-bat to Daulton Varsho, walking him on a 3-2 knuckle-curve. Christian Walker followed with his 24th home run, a two-run drive to right-center that made it 3-0.
Cole did not blame the pitch to Walker. He credited the swing.
“It was a well-executed and convicted pitch,” Cole said, “and he squared it up and he put a really good swing on it.”
Manager Aaron Boone kept returning to the same theme afterward. The Yankees had chances. They simply could not convert them.
“We just missed a couple chances there,” Boone said. “Couldn’t cash in there early where we had a couple small opportunities. Thought Wesneski did a good job.”
A shortstop’s slump reaches 111-year Yankees territory
New York got its lone run in the sixth. Ben Rice doubled, moved up on a fly out and scored on Cody Bellinger’s sacrifice fly. George Lombard Jr. followed with the first triple of his career, then was stranded when Spencer Jones fouled out.
Lombard’s glove, long considered his strongest tool, has become a nightly worry. In the eighth, Yainer Díaz sent a playable grounder to his right. Lombard ranged over well but the ball kicked off the heel of his glove toward third baseman Jose Caballero, who spun and threw wildly to first. Two errors on one play let an unearned run score.
It was the sixth straight game in which Lombard committed an error. Per statistician Katie Sharp, the last Yankees shortstop with an error in six consecutive games was Roger Peckinpaugh in 1915. The last Yankee at any position to do it was Chick Fewster at second base in 1921. Boone insisted the young infielder will recover.
“You start not wanting to make a mistake,” Boone said. “The good thing about George is he’s so skilled and gifted out there. And foundationally, he’s really good too. He will get through it.”
A wild-card race tightens with Boston next
The 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position was more than a bad night. It marked the Yankees’ 39th game this season with no hits in such spots, tied with the Mets and Reds for the most in the majors. For a Yankees lineup that had just started to trust itself, the problem resurfaced at the worst possible moment.
Jazz Chisholm Jr. remains one bright spot. His seventh-inning strikeout ended a run of reaching base in seven straight plate appearances, but he has hit .440 since Aug. 19 and stole two more bases to pad his AL-leading total of 36. Peña later homered off Yerry de los Santos for a 4-1 Houston lead, his 16th of the year.
The defeat left the Yankees four games behind Tampa Bay in the AL East and just two games clear of Boston for the top wild-card spot. The Astros, at 67-67, took two of three despite arriving in the Bronx amid front-office turmoil, and have now won five of their last seven at Yankee Stadium.
Now the Red Sox arrive for a four-game series over three days, a set that could decide home-field advantage in a wild-card round. Cam Schlittler, 11-6 with a 2.16 ERA, is scheduled to open it Friday against Patrick Sandoval. Boone, as always, looked forward rather than back.
“We got to flip the script here and turn the page and get ready to go knowing we got a lot of baseball to play in these next three days with four games,” Boone said. “We’ll be ready to go.”
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