The Yankees lost to the Nationals on Tuesday

The Yankees had a disappointing loss to the Washington Nationals on Tuesday.

The Nationals are 13 games below .500 and they have a -62 run differential. The Yankees are 23 games above .500 and they have an outstanding +129 run differential, which is the best run differential in Major League Baseball. The Phillies have the second best run differential in Major League Baseball with their +120. The Phillies are tied with the Yankees and the Dodgers for most wins in MLB.

Patrick Corbin, who the Yankees were interested in signing before the 2019 season, had a lot of success against the Yankees offense throwing six shutout innings with just two hits allowed. Corbin has led MLB in losses in each of the last three seasons and leads the league in losses this season as well. Corbin entered this game with the highest ERA of any qualified pitcher in MLB this season by a significant margin at 5.73. In this game, he did not pitch like he has the worst ERA of any qualified pitcher.

Corbin pitched very well in 2019 in his seventh MLB season and first with the Nationals helping them win the World Series with a 3.25 ERA in 33 starts and a 138 ERA+ but has not pitched well since then since he has had an ERA+ of below 100 (league average) in his last five seasons since the 2019 season.

Corbin has had better results recently as he has allowed just three total runs in his last three starts but in his previous three starts he allowed a combined 18 earned runs including 10 earned runs in a start in 3.0 innings pitched.

Corbin grew up in Clay NY, a suburb of Syracuse. He wears Number 46 in honor of Yankee great Andy Pettitte. Corbin had a very good cutter in this game just like Pettitte did. Corbin threw six scoreless innings for the first time all season. Corbin struck out Jazz Chisholm on his very good cutter in the 4th inning.

Gerrit Cole had five strikeouts in the first three innings. Cole did not have his best command of his pitches and had an off night for him since he allowed three earned runs in 5.0 innings pitched while allowing six hits, a walk and two home runs.

Andres Chaparro had his first MLB homer with his homer off a high Cole fastball in the 4th inning. Jose Tena then hit a homer on a fastball right down the middle to give the Nationals back-to-back homers. Cole did not allow a homer in his previous four starts and allowed two in back-to-back at-bats. Joey Gallo, who had an 84 OPS+ in his 140 games with the Yankees in 2021 and 2022 seasons, then had a hard hit double to the wall that Juan Soto couldn’t catch. Opponents hit just .143 against Cole’s 4-seamer in his previous four starts but that pitch was not good four him in the 4th inning.

Cole got a strikeout on a well located slider to end the 5th inning to strand the runner on second who got a good jump on his steal.

Aaron Judge doubled to right with two outs in the first inning but then was stranded at second when Giancarlo Stanton struck out swinging. The Yankees went an inept 0–8 with runners in scoring position in this game and Stanton went 0–2 in those situations in this game.

Anthony Volpe grounded out to shortstop to end the 4th inning. Gleyber Torres extended his on base streak to 22 games in this game. He had a single and a walk.

Gallo hit a grounder in 6th inning that DJ LeMahieu should have caught but he bobbled it allowing Dylan Crews to score. It was an error and he should have caught Jose Trevino’s throw from home earlier in the sixth inning. Trevino then threw to second on a steal attempt with nobody covering. Trevino was initially charged with an error on that play but it was later charged to Torres for not covering second. This was a very sloppy defensive 6th inning after the Yankees had one of their best defensive games of the season in the first game of the series.

The Yankees had three errors in the 6th inning and a missed tag at third base by Jazz Chisholm that was not called an error. Trevino was charged with one error on his throw to first that LeMahieu should have caught. Torres got an error for not covering second on Trevino’s throw and LeMahieu had his fielding error in the sixth. Torres flied out to Crews in deep right to end the game. It was a sloppy game with four total errors and Yankees did not have success against Corbin after he had struggled for much of the 2024 season.

Judge batted with the bases loaded and no outs in the 8th inning but he hit into a double play on a 3–1 count. Judge is usually better in a clutch situations. The Yankees had the bases loaded and not outs but only scored one run that inning to give them their first run of the game and then they scored their second run of the game on a Volpe RBI groundout that scored Chisholm. Aaron Boone left LeMahieu in the game in the 9th instead of putting in a lefty and that decision backfired since LeMahieu fouled out to right.

Volpe has been hitting better recently and he has been hitting low pitches well recently. Volpe was 1–4 in this game after going 3–4 with a double in the first game of the series. He has at least one hit in eight of his last 10 games. He has a .297 average (11–37) in those 10 games after going 2–34 in his previous nine games.

Scott Effross is a pitcher that the Yankees should call up tomorrow from Triple-A Scranton. He has a great 1.69 ERA in eight games this month at Triple-A with just two earned runs and one walk in 10.2 innings in those eight games. Tim Mayza has a 5.40 ERA in his five games with the Yankees and Effross should also be on the roster instead of Phil Bickford, who held the Nationals scoreless in one inning on Tuesday.