General manager Brian Cashman has never been shy about telling anyone who asks that he likes building the Yankees around left-handed power. It’s games such as Friday’s 6-1 loss to the Twins — when the power goes out — that make it easy to see why.
Sure, the Yankees got nine hits and collected four walks, but it resulted in just that one run, which wasn’t nearly enough for Vidal Nuno.
Waiting for a home run, or even a well-timed double, the Yankees weren’t able to capitalize on chances.
“There’s a lot of ways to score runs, but when you don’t hit ball over the fence you definitely have to find ways to manufacture runs,” said Brett Gardner, who stole two bases. “We didn’t do a good job of that tonight.”
It’s more difficult when Carlos Beltran is still on the shelf, Mark Teixeira walks three times and Brian McCann continues to search for his home-run swing. After slugging five homers against the Pirates on May 17, the Yankees have just four in their last 12 games.
And to make matters worse for the Yankees, who had just closed out a long road trip with four wins in their last five games, they repeatedly ran into trouble on the bases.
All that, coupled with Nuno surrendering three homers to a Twins team that had dropped six of seven and hadn’t scored more than four runs in a game since May 20, added up to another loss at The Stadium, where the Yankees are 3-8 in their last 11.
Nuno’s difficulties at home continued, as Oswaldo Arcia, Josh Willingham and Trevor Plouffe all went deep against him.
“It was just leaving fastballs up and I cannot be doing that,” Nuno said.
Manager Joe Girardi said he thought the lefty threw pretty well, but “when he made a mistake they hit it out of the ballpark.”
Still, Nuno managed to survive 6 ²/₃ innings and didn’t allow a run after giving up three in the fourth. But the offense couldn’t get going and Preston Claiborne coughed up two runs in relief of Nuno.
After Arcia crushed a solo shot to right off Nuno in the second, the Yankees tied the game in the third when Jacoby Ellsbury’s two-out double to right scored Gardner.
But Nuno (1-2) fell apart quickly in the fourth, giving up homers to Willingham and Plouffe, and the Yankees’ offense was unable to bail him out.
They never hit Nolasco (3-5) hard and when they did have chances against the right-hander, they were unable to capitalize.
That was due in part to repeatedly running into trouble on the basepaths.
With the Yankees trailing by three runs in the fifth, Derek Jeter followed Gardner’s single and stolen base with a hit to right. Gardner was held at third, but Jeter ranged far past first base and was caught in a rundown that eventually ended with Gardner being thrown out between third and home and Jeter at third with two outs.
“I assumed he was going [home] and I shouldn’t have assumed that,” Jeter said.
Ellsbury’s foul popup ended the threat.
Two innings later, with runners on first and second and two outs, Yangervis Solarte snapped an 0-for-16 slide with a single to right. Third base coach Rob Thomson waved Brian Roberts home from second, but the strong-armed Arcia’s throw got Roberts at the plate.
The Yankees suffered through a lethargic defeat to begin a seven-game homestand and will rely once again on Masahiro Tanaka to get them back on track on Saturday.
“It seemed like we were a little flat offensively and didn’t have the big inning we were looking for,” Gardner said.