CHICAGO — For Gerrit Cole’s thirty fourth birthday, the Yankees gave their ace the equal of coal.
They damage him defensively, resulting in a pair of unearned runs in opposition to him, and didn’t present a lot with their bats.
That mixture was sufficient to price the Yankees an opportunity at a sweep as they fell to the Cubs, 2-1, on Sunday afternoon at Wrigley Area.
Cole was sturdy throughout six innings of labor, permitting simply three hits and one stroll whereas hanging out seven whereas dueling together with his finest buddy Jameson Taillon. Cole retired the ultimate 12 batters he confronted and 15 of 16 after the primary inning, nevertheless it was that opening body — extended by a Gleyber Torres fielding error — that got here again to hang-out the Yankees (82-61) as they missed an opportunity to increase their lead past a half-game over the Orioles atop the AL East.
Taillon, who threw eight shutout innings in opposition to the Yankees final July, stifled his former teammates once more Sunday, tossing six innings of one-run ball. The Yankees went 1-for-8 with runners in scoring place and left seven males on base.
Cole had two outs and a person on first base within the backside of the primary inning when Cody Bellinger hit a pointy floor ball to second base. Torres tried to play it on the backhand however booted it for his seventeenth error of the season, permitting each runners to be protected.
Ex-Yankee Mike Tauchman then put collectively a troublesome at-bat in opposition to Cole, strolling on the tenth pitch he noticed after fouling off 4 pitches and taking two shut balls close to the zone to load the bases.
Isaac Paredes got here up subsequent and blooped a single into left-center area to place the Cubs up 2-0.
In addition to resulting in the 2 runs, Torres’ error pressured Cole to throw 31 pitches within the inning, which helped finish his day after six.
The Yankees put runners on the corners with one out within the second inning, however got here away with just one run on a sacrifice fly from Anthony Volpe. Left fielder Ian Happ, who had a terrific sport defensively, made a robust diving catch on Volpe’s sinking liner to make it a sac fly.
The Cubs almost gifted the Yankees a run within the sixth inning, when Giancarlo Stanton hit a fly ball to deep heart area that Pete Crow-Armstrong misplaced within the solar because it dropped for a double with one out. However Jazz Chisholm Jr. struck out, after which after Taillon balked Stanton to 3rd base, Anthony Rizzo grounded out to finish the menace.
Clay Holmes, in his first look since dropping the nearer’s job on Tuesday, breezed by means of a scoreless eighth inning with two strikeouts.
