For an offense that was already struggling mightily entering Tuesday, the prospect of facing Tyler Glasnow didn’t offer much comfort to the Yankees.
But they did just enough to hold serve against the Rays’ ace then finally came through against the Tampa Bay bullpen at long last.
After the Yankees wasted quality scoring chances in four straight innings, Clint Frazier lifted them to a 5-3 win over the Rays with a walk-off, two-run home run in the 11th inning to snap a four-game losing streak.
“We needed that,” manager Aaron Boone said. “Some better things across the board — not close to where we need to be, but an important day today to pull that one out, and a great AB there by ‘Fraze’ to finish it off.”
Frazier’s game-winning blast came just three innings after he made a diving catch to end a Rays’ scoring threat in the eighth inning.
The Yankees (30-25), who entered the day scoring 3.74 runs per game (tied for fourth-worst in MLB), were 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position before Frazier’s blast, which came off Andrew Kittredge with two outs in the 11th. They handed the Rays (35-21) just their second loss in their past 18 games.
Luis Cessa threw a perfect top of the 11th inning to strand the Rays’ automatic runner on second and give the Yankees a chance to record their fifth walk-off in the bottom of the inning.
“It’s a feeling I’m sure I won’t forget, just because of what we’ve been going through as a team, what I’ve been going through individually,” said Frazier, who is hitting .306 over his past 11 games after starting the season .141 through 34 games. “We needed that win. Obviously we gotta build off it and show up tomorrow and try to get another ‘W’ that’s a little bit easier than that one.”
The Yankees looked like they were ready to finally break through in each of the four innings before the 11th, only to come up empty each time and keep the 3-3 tie intact.
Gary Sanchez, who came to the plate in the 10th inning hearing chants of, “Ga-ry, Ga-ry,” soon turned them into boos when he struck out to leave the bases loaded. DJ LeMahieu smoked a ball with two outs and two on in the ninth, but it found the glove of second baseman Brandon Lowe. Giancarlo Stanton stranded runners on first and second in the eighth when he pinch hit and grounded out to end the inning.
The Yankees even got one last shot at Glasnow in the seventh inning, which Sanchez led off with a double. But he was thrown out trying to take third on a ground ball to shortstop — the Yankees’ league-leading 27th out on the bases this season — and Glasnow ended the inning five pitches later.
Domingo German gave the Yankees five innings but was hurt by the long ball again — two of the hits he allowed were home runs, which resulted in all three Rays runs.
The Yankees got to Glasnow for two runs in the third inning, on a bases-loaded walk and wild pitch, before Miguel Andujar homered for the second straight game — briefly giving the Yankees a 3-2 lead in the fourth before Kevin Kiermaier tied it with a solo shot the next inning.
Before Frazier won it with his bat, he saved the Yankees with his glove. Chad Green had put runners on the corners with two outs before Joey Wendle hit a shallow fly ball to right field. Frazier didn’t make it easy on himself, taking an indirect route, but sprawled out to make a diving catch to end the inning.
“There was a lot of happiness in that [clubhouse] because we have been going through some stuff as a team and a lot of guys individually,” Frazier said. “So when we all come together the way that we did tonight to keep the game where it was and then win it was big for a lot of us.”