About 30 minutes before the first pitch of a game that had been postponed due to rain, a rainbow appeared in the clouds above Yankee Stadium.
When beauty left the Bronx, ugliness moved in.
In an eventful game that featured unusual benchings, comebacks and too many mistakes, perhaps the most concerning development for the Yankees was how Marcus Stroman was once again thrashed in an 8-5 loss in the series opener against the Blue Jays on Friday before a crowd of 44,883.
Gleyber Torres didn’t panic after hitting a 363-foot single that hit the left field fence and cost the Yankees a run that seemed to cost Torres in the middle and later innings of the game.
The Yankees squandered Aaron Judge’s third-longest home run of his career and a 10-hit blast.
They scored three runs in the fifth inning and had a chance to turn the game around, but Stroman’s offense had already put the opponents in deep, so they were unable to make the comeback.
Aaron Boone’s team (65-46) couldn’t maintain its momentum from a six-five road trip, digging itself a big hole before the third inning ended, and Stroman couldn’t get out of it.
The right-hander gave up seven runs in a game in which he recorded eight outs.
Alarm bells are being sounded for the 33-year-old player whose performance and velocity have declined.
Stroman is off to a strong start in his first season in a pinstriped uniform, seeing his ERA improve from 2.60 to 4.10 in his past 10 starts.
Since the start of June, he has allowed 33 earned runs in 47 innings (6.31 ERA), and his mid-season slump has been problematic not just in terms of results, but also in terms of the quality of his pitching.
Stroman relies more on finesse than gas, but he still needs heat to succeed: His four-seam fastball averaged 90 mph this season, but it was down to 88.8 mph on Friday.
His average slider velocity dropped from 85.4 to 83.9 mph.
Strowman’s routine (and execution) may have also been affected by the match being delayed by about an hour and a half.
Whatever happened, it quickly got out of hand.
The Blue Jays sent seven batters to the plate in the first inning, scoring three runs on some powerful hits.
The hits were a one-run single (against the infield) on a grounder by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and a two-run double by Ernie Clement that hit the left field fence.
After two innings, four of Toronto’s six batters reached base, including RBI singles by Spencer Hortowitz and Clement.
Stroman could have ended the inning with a double play when Davis Schneider hit a sweet one-bounce liner to Ben Rice, but the budding first baseman took a few steps toward first base (where Clement was caught) and then turned around and threw to second, a misplay that resulted in only one out being recorded on the play.
Stroman threw 64 pitches after walking two batters and was replaced with the bases loaded and two outs.
Michael Tonkin came on and gave up a two-run single to Brian Serven to make the score 7-2.
The Yankees never led until Judge hit a two-run homer, 477 feet into the deep left field stands in the top of the first inning. It was his longest hit since his rookie year in 2017 and his 40th of the season.
Other players who hit 40 home runs over three seasons with the Yankees include Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Mickey Mantle.
For the Yankees, it was the best moment of the night, because what followed was disappointment in so many ways.
In what has been a tough signing season, Torres has turned some positive moments into major negative ones.
He hit two balls over the left field fence and only took a few steps to reach first base.
Two at-bats later, Anthony Volpe hit a double into the right field corner, and Torres, who was on first base, was out at home.
Torres pitched the next inning but appeared to be benched late and was replaced by Oswaldo Cabrera in the fourth.
The Yankees took the lead in the fifth inning when Volpe (3-for-4) hit a two-run homer and Austin Wells singled to score Juan Soto.
However, with a runner on base to tie the game, Giancarlo Stanton popped out, and then Jazz Chisholm Jr., making his home debut, struck out.
With the Yankees trailing by seven runs in the inning, Chisholm (0-for-4) struck out again with Stanton on second base to end the seventh inning.
If there was a bright side to Chisholm’s bad days, it was that plenty of other Yankees had worse days.
