BOSTON — After the Red Sox dug the Yankees’ grave the first three games of the series, Hanley Ramirez stomped on it Sunday, and the Yankees ended up on the wrong end of another Boston Massacre.
Ramirez hit a pair of homers to send the Yankees to their fifth straight defeat, a 5-4 loss in which the Yankees blew a four-run lead, CC Sabathia made a costly error and the team dropped four games back of the Blue Jays for the second wild-card spot with 13 games to play.
“Brutal,” Tyler Clippard said of the series. “It’s pretty self-explanatory when you get swept in a situation like we had.”
Another questionable move by Joe Girardi in the fateful fifth didn’t help matters.
Ramirez, who went deep four times in the series, hit a two-out, three-run homer off Sabathia in the fifth to get the Red Sox back in the game and then sent another rocket out to left off Clippard to put them in front in the seventh.
It helped erase another fast start for the Yankees, who got another home run from Gary Sanchez.
Sabathia looked to be on his way to a second straight strong performance — until the fifth.
With runners on first and second and one out, Mookie Betts lined back to Sabathia, who caught it for the second out. Sabathia then tried to double Xander Bogaerts off of first, but the bad-fielding Sabathia made an errant throw that first baseman Billy Butler couldn’t handle and both runners advanced.
“That’s the difference in the game,” Girardi said.
“It was a tough play,” Sabathia said. “I tried to hit him on the move and ended up short-arming it.”
Girardi then had Sabathia pitch to Ramirez — with first base open — and Chris Young on deck.
Though Ramirez entered the game hitless in 10 at-bats against the lefty, he has been one of the hottest hitters in the league of late. The result was sadly predictable, as Ramirez went deep — again — for a three-run homer to make it 4-3.
“It was a pitch off the plate and he went out and got it,” Sabathia said. “I wasn’t trying to give in to him and throw him something he could do that with — and he ended up doing it anyway.’’
It wasn’t quite as dramatic as his walk-off against Dellin Betances on Thursday, but it got the Red Sox back into the game.
Girardi scoffed at the notion of walking Ramirez.
“That doesn’t make any sense to me,” Girardi said. “I know he’s hot. What if [Young] hits a home run? I’m putting the tying run at the plate. I trust CC. He had pitched well. It’s too early in the game to do that. I’m not gonna put the tying run to the plate if I don’t have to.”
The tying run did come to the plate — and Sabathia retired Young for the third time on the night.
After three hits to start the sixth tied it, Sabathia was pulled for right-hander Blake Parker, who improbably fanned pinch-hitter David Ortiz on three pitches.
Parker got out of the inning with the game tied at 4-4, but with one out in the seventh, Ramirez turned on a Clippard changeup and sent it screaming over the Green Monster to put Boston ahead for the first time — and for good.
The Yankees had raced to a four-run lead on an RBI single by Didi Gregorius in the first, a solo homer by Sanchez in the third and a pair of runs in the fourth to knock out Drew Pomeranz.
But as has happened so often this series, the Yankees couldn’t hold on for long.
Now, they head to Florida to face the Rays in St. Petersburg, looking for a miracle.
“That would help,” said Mark Teixeira, who flied to center to end it with Sanchez on first. “I’ll pray if you do.”