The Bronx is burning.
Just like the Yankees proved who they were when they won five straight against lowly St. Louis and Tampa Bay, they’re doing it again in this series against Boston.
With Saturday’s 12-1 embarrassment at the Stadium, the Yankees have now dropped eight consecutive games to their rivals, and are on the verge of getting swept at the Stadium on Sunday night.
And it’s not a new development.
They have lost every series they’ve played against an above-.500 team since sweeping the Mariners from July 8-10.
And prior to that series, you have to go back to a sweep of the Royals a month earlier for another series victory against a winning club.
“It comes down to: We’ve got to play better,’’ Aaron Judge said. “It doesn’t matter who we’re facing: the Rays, Red Sox, Tigers, whoever. We’ve got to go out there with our best and we didn’t do that today or the last couple games.”
With “Let’s go Red Sox!” chants coming from the crowd in a train wreck top of the ninth inning that featured misplays all over the field in a seven-run inning, as well as a Paul Blackburn balk that forced in a run, the Yankees have let any momentum they built on the road slip away entirely.
“We’ve got to do the little things to put ourselves in the best position,” Judge said. “We can’t give teams extra outs. Teams are gonna give us a chance to score and get some guys over, we’ve got to capitalize. We haven’t done that, especially the last three games.”
It was a message repeated by the Yankees after their latest sloppy loss, as Giancarlo Stanton called their recent performance “unacceptable.”
The outcome of this one was hardly a surprise, as the Yankees were dominated by Garrett Crochet for the second straight time.
The lefty held them to one run over seven innings — with 11 strikeouts — after he gave up just one run over 8 ¹/₃ innings against them in a June 13 start at Fenway Park.
And just like in other games in this series, the Yankees were also done in by their own mistakes.
On Saturday, the first one came in the third inning when Austin Wells misplayed a tough foul pop-up by Alex Bregman to extend the inning for Will Warren.
Bregman walked and two batters later, Trevor Story’s two-run double gave the Red Sox the lead for good.
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The Yankees had a chance to get back in the game against ex-Yankee right-hander Greg Weissert, as Judge doubled and Cody Bellinger singled to bring up Stanton — who’d provided their only offense against Crochet with a leadoff homer in the bottom of the fourth, their first run since the fifth inning Thursday.
But Stanton whiffed and pinch-hitter Jazz Chisholm Jr. struck out against left-hander Justin Wilson.
Warren was unable to get out of the fifth inning for a second straight start and got into a bigger hole in the fourth, loading the bases with no one out, which led to sacrifice flies by Roman Anthony and Bregman to make it 4-0.
After Paul Goldschmidt’s one-out single in the fifth, Judge hit one to the wall in right, but Anthony made the catch.
It all follows a five-game winning streak that got the Yankees back atop the AL wild-card race.
And with the Red Sox having dropped three in a row — and seven of 10 — entering the series, the Yankees had a chance to put some space between them and Boston in the standings.
Instead, they’re looking up in the wild-card race — and watching Toronto take a commanding lead in the division.
“We’re not running out of time,” Boone said. “But if we don’t [play] better, we’re gonna fizzle out and we’re not gonna get to where we want to be.”
Judge said he was “definitely angry” about the results, “especially against our rivals.”
They’ll turn to Carlos Rodón on Sunday to avoid the sweep.
“It feels really crappy,” Boone said of the first three games of the crucial series. “We’ve got to get past it. We’ve got to play better against quality opponents in our division, but we can’t go erase what’s been a really crappy weekend for us so far.”