Yankees doomed by horrible situational hitting, bad baserunning in loss to A's

The New York Yankees split their four-game set with the Oakland Athletics and were very much close to losing the series had one other bounce not gone their way. Thursday night represented everything that fans have been complaining about over the last few years that have held the Yankees back.

On the evening, the Yankees logged 11 hits and notched four walks. They scored one run, going 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position. Gleyber Torres took a run off the board himself by getting picked off because, on the very next pitch, Jose Trevino homered over the short porch.

Overall, the offense stranded 11 runners on base. Eleven. They grounded into two inning-ending double plays when they loaded the bases on two separate occasions. They came away with zero runs when they had the bases loaded with nobody out and the bases loaded with one out.

And all it took was two bad pitches from Nestor Cortes to give the A's the 3-1 victory. The left-hander lasted seven innings, but his mistakes to Nick Allen (the husband of manager Aaron Boone's neice) and Tyler Nevin (the son of former Yankees third base coach Phil Nevin) overshadowed the fact he was able to give the pitching staff length. His pouting after the solo shot surrendered to Allen helped the A's prolong the inning and get two more runs on the board.

But the main problem is the team's overall inability to execute offensively. Their lack of situational hitting outside of Juan Soto and Alex Verdugo is scary, and those two guys aren't signed beyond this season.

Yankees doomed by horrible situational hitting, bad baserunning in loss to A's

The Yankees let Alex Wood off the hook early, which helped set the tone for the left-hander to throw 5 2/3 innings of one-run ball. His ERA on the season is now 6.59. If the Yankees can't hit struggling lefties, then why do they exist?

It wouldn't be an infuriating loss without a Gleyber Torres blunder, either, now would it? We have no idea what happened here, but his attempt at a steal in this situation was confounding.

Though Trevino's offensive output continued with that homer, he murdered the Yankees' vibes just two innings later when he was tasked with doing anything but this when the bases were loaded. Again, nobody else on this roster can put the proper bat on ball. It's just "swing" no matter the circumstances.

Hitting a baseball is admittedly the hardest thing to do in professional sports, but the Yankees somehow make it harder with all star power they possess. They lead the league in grounding into double plays. They're sporting a .377 slugging percentage (19th in MLB) and .706 OPS (14th in MLB).

The Yankees' record has silenced a lot of the concerns with this roster. And fans hate to sound pessimistic when things are technically going well. But, on the surface, the Yankees have enough talent to mask many of their deficiencies, which has made it hard to fully enjoy the early success.

These issues need to be fixed, whether the team is winning or not. It's not a formula for postseason wins, and it's not promoting an enjoyable product to watch.