Reds 4, Yankees 1. Tyler Stephenson hit a 401-foot three-run homer to left center in the fourth inning and the game told you it was done before the Reds even touched first base again. The New York Yankees spent the final five frames trying to make it interesting. They could not.
Ben Rice had given them a lead first -- his 22nd home run of the season, a solo shot to right center off Chase Burns in the bottom of the third -- and for about one inning it felt like the offense might actually show up on a Sunday afternoon. Then the fourth happened. And the Yankees went quietly.
The Inning That Decided It
Nathaniel Lowe worked a walk to start the top of the fourth. Noelvi Marte singled to right, moving Lowe to second. Elmer Rodríguez had two runners on and a lineup that was very much awake, and then Tyler Stephenson came up.
Stephenson hit it to left center. 401 feet. Three runs. CIN 3, NYY 1.
The win probability swing on that at-bat was about 33 points. (That's a lot.) There wasn't really a comeback arc after it. The Yankees loaded the bases in the sixth, put runners on in the seventh, went 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position on the day -- and none of that got fixed.
Chase Burns Is Really Good
The other half of the story is that Chase Burns is 9-1 with a 2.00 ERA and has won eight in a row -- the first Reds pitcher to do that since Tom Browning in 1989, for whatever historical company means to you. He went five innings Sunday, allowed Rice's solo shot and four other hits, walked three, and struck out seven.
He wasn't untouchable. The Yankees had baserunners. They just couldn't do anything with them, which is partly the offense's problem and partly a function of pitching that commands the zone well enough to make the bad count you need feel impossible to get to.
Tony Santillan finished it off with 2.0 innings and a save. The Reds' bullpen stranded everything the Yankees put on the bases in the sixth and seventh. It was a clean win for Cincinnati.
Six Stolen Bases, One Run
This is where it gets strange.
The Yankees stole six bases today. Jasson Domínguez, Cody Bellinger, and Jazz Chisholm Jr. each swiped two bags -- the first time since 2013 the team had taken that many in a single game. Plenty of wheels out there. The stolen-base totals look great in a box score.
The team scored one run.
Rice went 2-for-3 with the homer and a walk, carrying a .294/.389/.616 slash line into today and a six-game hitting streak. He did his job. The rest of the lineup went 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position, and that's a sentence you can't really dress up. Amed Rosario singled in the sixth with Caballero on third. Goldschmidt flied out. That was the closest it got.
You don't lose this game because you didn't steal enough bases. You lose it because you couldn't put the bat on the ball when it counted.
Rodríguez Takes the Start
The Yankees held Gerrit Cole for Monday -- no reason to burn him in a three-game set when Detroit starts tomorrow -- and handed the ball to Elmer Rodríguez instead.
Rodríguez is 22 years old. He made his MLB debut on April 29th. Paul Blackburn opened the game with 1.1 innings and gave him a clean slate, and Rodríguez worked into the fifth, going 4.0 innings, allowing 4 hits, 3 earned runs, a pair of walks, and 4 strikeouts. He's now 0-2 with a 4.76 ERA in his young career.
Outside of the Stephenson homer, he wasn't a mess. The fourth inning just cost him -- one bad sequence, one big swing, and suddenly a close game had a three-run gap. That's how it goes sometimes when you're 22 and starting for a first-place team. The margin for error is thinner than it looks.
What's Next
The Yankees are 46-30 and still sitting on top of the AL East, two games up on Tampa Bay. They've lost two straight and dropped this series to a 37-39 Cincinnati team that is clearly better than its record suggests.
Cole goes Monday in Detroit, and the Tigers have been nothing to worry about this year. But the Bronx was quiet on Sunday afternoon, and for a team this good, two straight losses to the Reds sting a little more than the standings reflect.
Jimmy writes the Bronx Pinstripes game recap after every Yankees game. Beat-reporter pacing, fan's heartbeat. He calls opposing players by last name and has no patience for dead-air innings.
