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When the Yankees left The Bronx after their first homestand of the season, their offense — and their torpedo bats — were the talk of the sport.
Their first two games in Pittsburgh did nothing to change that as the Yankees put up 19 runs to open that series, giving them 72 runs in their first eight games.
But since then, the lineup has been much less intimidating, scoring 10 runs over the final four games of their road trip.
A return to the Stadium didn’t help Friday, as the Yankees offense was quiet again against the Giants in a 9-1 loss that was cut short in the sixth inning and served as their fourth defeat in five games.
Certainly, the cold and wet conditions Friday night didn’t help, as the weather played a role in keeping Austin Wells’ shot to right in the park — barely — in the bottom of the second.
But besides that, the Yankees didn’t threaten much against left-hander Robbie Ray.
“It’s the ups and downs of the season,” Cody Bellinger said of the recent downturn. “No excuses. We’d all like to not be in this position, but we’ll keep fighting to be better. It’s a long year, and these are the kinds of things you have to fight through.”
The Yankee hitters who entered the game slumping mostly kept slumping, like Jazz Chisholm Jr., who was hitless in his previous 16 at-bats coming in and looked very uncomfortable on the frigid night.
Bellinger’s struggles continued, as he took a 3-for-18 streak into the game and went 0-for-3 with a pair of strikeouts.
Perhaps on the encouraging side, Anthony Volpe reached base twice, and Wells had his blast in the second.
Overall, though, a Yankees team that hammered 24 homers in its first eight games now has just one home run in its past five games.
And after compiling a team OPS of 1.011 through eight games, it was just .541 over the previous four games prior to Friday.
Just as suddenly, the questions surrounding the torpedo bats that caught everyone’s attention barely a week ago seem to have disappeared.
Their offensive struggles were masked by Marcus Stroman’s disastrous start Friday, when the right-hander failed to get out of the first inning and put the Yankees in an early five-run hole they weren’t able to get out of.
