NEW YORK — The Yankees had enough pitching to finish a sweep. They had enough traffic to put pressure on the White Sox. They even had a chance to turn another low-scoring night into a late Bronx escape.
Instead, they kept giving away outs.
The Yankees’ 5-1 loss to the White Sox on Thursday night at Yankee Stadium will land first on Andrew Benintendi’s grand slam and Camilo Doval’s latest high-leverage stumble. That swing decided the scoreboard. But the Yankees created the conditions for the loss much earlier.
Their baserunning kept shrinking the game.
New York managed six hits and tied the score on Ryan McMahon’s solo homer in the third. Ryan Weathers gave the Yankees a strong start, holding Chicago to one run over 6 1/3 innings. The bullpen did not protect the tie in the eighth, but the offense had already wasted several chances to change the game’s direction.
The Yankees did not get beat only by one pitch. They also beat themselves on the bases.
Yankees lose chances before White Sox strike
The first mistake came after Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s painful fourth-inning exit. Chisholm fouled a ball off the area near his groin and left the game. Anthony Volpe finished the plate appearance and walked, giving the Yankees a two-out baserunner in a 1-1 game.
The chance disappeared almost immediately.
Volpe tried to steal second during Spencer Jones’ at-bat and was thrown out. The inning ended without Jones getting a full chance to swing with a runner aboard.
That play set the tone.
In the fifth, Jose Caballero opened another door. He singled to center and moved to second when Tristan Peters misplayed the ball. The Yankees had a runner in scoring position with one out and McMahon at the plate, already responsible for their only run.
Then Caballero was picked off second.
That mistake erased the threat before it formed. McMahon eventually struck out, and another inning slipped away.
Those two outs mattered because Sean Burke gave the Yankees almost nothing. The White Sox bulk reliever worked behind opener Bryan Hudson and controlled the game across 7 1/3 innings. He allowed only one run and struck out eight. Against that kind of pitching, free outs become damaging.
The Yankees handed Chicago more than one.
Volpe’s gamble turns into another empty inning
The most visible baserunning mistake came in the seventh.
Volpe drove a ball over left fielder Junior Perez’s head and appeared to give the Yankees a spark. In a tie game, a one-out double would have put the go-ahead run in scoring position for Jones.
Volpe wanted more.
Perez, making his major league debut, recovered quickly and fired a strong one-hop throw to Colson Montgomery at third. Volpe was tagged out by several feet. Instead of a runner at second and one out, the Yankees had two outs and no one on.
Jones struck out looking to end the inning.
That sequence became the last real chance before the game broke open.
The Yankees were not wrong to play with urgency. They have built part of their identity around pressure, athleticism and taking extra bases. But there is a difference between forcing the opponent to make a play and making the opponent’s decision easy.
On Thursday, the White Sox did not need to be perfect. The Yankees made several plays too simple for them.
Doval destroys Yankees late
The game finally turned in the eighth.
Sam Antonacci led off with a double against Fernando Cruz. Tim Hill entered and hit Jacob Gonzalez, then hit Tristan Peters to load the bases. Hill struck out Chase Meidroth, but Aaron Boone went to Camilo Doval with one out and the game tied.
Benintendi, who played for the Yankees in 2022, came off the bench for Randal Grichuk. Doval threw one pitch. Benintendi drove a 100 mph sinker into the right-center seats for a grand slam.
The swing gave Chicago a 5-1 lead and silenced a Yankees team that had no answer left.
Benintendi’s homer ended the White Sox’s nine-game losing streak at Yankee Stadium. It also stopped the Yankees’ four-game winning streak and denied them a sweep after they had outscored Chicago 22-7 in the first two games of the series.
The Yankees entered the night with momentum. They left it with a reminder that poor details can undercut strong stretches.
Weathers gives Yankees enough
The loss wasted one of Weathers’ best outings since joining the rotation.
The left-hander allowed Colson Montgomery’s solo homer in the second but settled in from there. He struck out eight, walked one and kept the White Sox from building pressure. He worked into the seventh and gave the Yankees exactly what they needed on a night when their lineup never found rhythm.
That made the missed chances stand out more.
The Yankees did not need a blowout. They needed one clean inning. They needed one runner to stay alive. They needed one extra-base hit to remain an extra-base hit, not become an out at third.
Instead, the offense played into Burke’s hands.
McMahon’s third-inning homer tied the score, but New York did not score again. Ben Rice singled in the sixth. Paul Goldschmidt reached on a fielder’s choice. Cody Bellinger popped out. The Yankees kept putting small pieces together but never built a real inning.
Their baserunning mistakes made sure of it.
The Yankees are still learning how thin the margin can become without Aaron Judge in the lineup. But this was the kind of game that showed what must improve while Judge remains out. They ran themselves out of the game.
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