Forget flirting with a no-hitter. Clarke Schmidt would have had to pitch a perfect game to give the Yankees a chance against the A’s on Saturday.
Instead, Schmidt — who hadn’t allowed a run his previous three starts — gave up four and the Yankees lineup went missing again, as they were thumped 7-0 by the lowly A’s in The Bronx.
After picking up a win on Friday with just four hits, the Yankees were completely shut down Saturday against ex-Yankee JP Sears and the A’s bullpen.
And the defeat displayed several worrying trends for the Yankees, who remain in first place in the AL East, but often haven’t looked like a first-place team. After being shut out just twice in their first 69 games, they’ve been blanked twice in their past 13 games.
Aaron Judge continued his cold streak and the rest of the lineup hasn’t been able to pick him up. He left a pair of runners on in the third, nearly sent one out in the sixth and ended the game by running into the final out at third base.
“In times like this, it comes down to getting a big hit with runners out there,’’ Aaron Boone said after the Yankees went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position. “We don’t have a lot of hits the last two days. We haven’t been hitting the long ball, either.”
Giancarlo Stanton hasn’t homered in the two weeks since he’s been back from elbow tendinitis, while Paul Goldschmidt, Anthony Volpe, DJ LeMahieu and — especially — Austin Wells are in serious slumps.
When that happens, mistakes like the one Wells made on Max Muncy’s bunt in the eighth — when the Yankees didn’t record an out on the play — and a botched relay to third from Cody Bellinger to Jazz Chisholm Jr. later in the inning become more magnified.
In Schmidt’s first start since he pitched seven innings of no-hit ball before being pulled after 103 pitches, the right-hander was solid until the sixth.
Schmidt saw his scoreless streak end at 28 innings when Brent Rooker took him deep with one out in the fourth. It was the longest single-season streak by a Yankee since Allie Reynolds pitched 30 straight shutout innings in 1951.
And Schmidt gave up a three-run shot to Nick Kurtz with one out in the sixth, as Schmidt allowed more than three runs — as well as more than one homer — for the first time since April 21.
Schmidt blamed that blast on “terrible pitch selections.”
The Yankees threatened against Sears for the first — and only — time in the bottom of the third.
LeMahieu opened with a walk before Sears retired Jasson Domínguez and Goldschmidt.
Volpe followed with the second walk of the inning to bring up Judge.
Sears fell behind 3-1 to Judge before he flied out to the warning track in right to keep the game scoreless.
Rooker homered off Schmidt in the next inning, which proved to be enough for Sears and the pen.
The lefty tossed 5 ²/₃ shutout innings, surprisingly dominant given Sears’ recent performance.
He began the season with an ERA of 2.80 over his first eight starts, but followed that with an 8.75 ERA in his next eight and had allowed eight earned runs in 8 ¹/₃ innings in his previous two starts heading into Saturday.
But he kept the Yankees off balance, with Bellinger’s opposite-field single in the first their only hit until Goldschmidt led off the bottom of the sixth with a base hit.
The A’s took control of the game in the sixth after Schmidt walked the first two batters of the inning. He recovered to fan Rooker on three pitches, but Kurtz homered into the right field seats to put the Yankees in a 4-0 hole.
And the Yankees couldn’t muster anything.
“We’re going through it a little bit right now,’’ LeMahieu said. “I have all the confidence in the world we’ll turn it around.”
Why?
“I saw it the first two months,” LeMahieu said. “It’s a long season … I know we’ll be fine.”