What can we say, beyond that when the game ended, no one feigned surprise. This was Destiny, 100-proof, a preordained outcome that followed every pitch, every pop fly. To bastardize a ditty from John Irving...
Whether you're early
Or whether you're late,
It's all the same to Fate.
Part was poor baserunning. Part was bad hitting. Part was the closing lineup of Joneses and Trammels, and six pitchers - an unsustainable drain on elbows and cuffs, which led to the Yankee debut of newly shaven Michael Harvey Tonkin, 34, the Doomsday horseman, signaling the outcome that lurked all night.
Honestly, where do you start, beyond the instinctive certainty that the Yankees would lose, even with a lead in the 10th. Too many dark omens, too many blown ops, too many missing links to the team's near past, all manifested in the presence of Tonkin, a statistical doppelganger (according to Baseball Reference) to the following elbow belchers:
Blas Minor
Ryan Dull
Carter Capps
Oliver Drake
Bill Burwell
Okay, look...
I don't mean to disparage Tonkin, who is feeding his family, and who actually might have thrown scoreless innings, if not for those pesky ghost runners. But his presence last night showcased the sorry state of the Yankee pitching staff - a group that is officially fried. We've moved past the Poteets and Burdis - long ago visited the moments when Scott Proctor would have burned his clothes at home plate - and we're now in the land of daily waiver wire pickups, scouring the landfills for usable parts. We have reached August Distress levels, and it's not even May 1.
The Yankees remain in second place, percentage points behind Baltimore, with a 5-5 record over their last 10 games. Today, there is no way in Hell to predict who will be pitching the late innings, except that he probably wore a Railriders jersey this week. Mike Axisa says this could be the toughest road trip all season. And we're already out of pitchers.
April is coming to an end. My only friend, the end...