After the Yankees squandered a terrific chance to break the game open — and perhaps knock out Zack Greinke — in the first inning Thursday, they saw another opportunity materialize during their 8-3 ALCS Game 4 loss in the Bronx.
This time, they loaded the bases with one out in the fifth inning, trailing by two runs — and with Greinke already removed.
Even better, perhaps their best hitter of the postseason, Gleyber Torres, was up.
But the second baseman, who pummeled opposing pitchers throughout the postseason until Thursday, suffered through one of the worst games of his career, going 0-for-5 with a pair of errors.
It culminated with a bases-loaded strikeout in the fifth, when he failed to check his swing at a Ryan Pressly 1-2 pitch in the dirt. First base umpire Mark Carlson ruled Torres swung for the second out.
Edwin Encarnacion whiffed to end the inning and the Yankees never got any closer.
Asked if he thought he swung at Strike 3, Torres said, “For sure.”
He gets points for honesty, but on this night, neither Torres nor the Yankees did much right — especially in the fifth.
The Astros didn’t waste time in capitalizing on the Yankees’ mistake, with Carlos Correa drilling a three-run homer off Chad Green in the top of the sixth to make the comeback attempt that much more difficult.
“We made errors and missed opportunities,’’ Torres said. “But we have to forget that, come in [Friday] and win the game.”
It wasn’t what Torres or manager Aaron Boone were looking for with Torres batting cleanup in a postseason game for the first time.
Torres came up in the first inning in a situation which was just what Boone would have envisioned when he penciled his name into the lineup.
With runners on first and second and one out against Greinke, Torres swung at the first pitch and popped to first.
Torres popped to right for the second out in the third inning with Greinke on the mound and came up with a chance to turn the tide in the fifth, with the Yankees trailing by two runs.
Greinke had been knocked out earlier in the inning after allowing a one-out single to DJ LeMahieu and a walk to Aaron Judge, replaced by Pressly, who then walked Aaron Hicks to load the bases.
But Torres couldn’t come through.
“I thought [Pressly] made some good pitches, mixed in both his curveball slider and threw some good fastballs in situations, too,’’ Boone said. “I think he did a good job of settling in and buckling down. We’ve had a little bit of success against him in this series, and then he made some pitches there to get out of an inning.’’
