SEATTLE — Nestor Cortes pitched well overall Tuesday night, but he ran into trouble in the fifth inning again.
Cortes began his evening with four scoreless innings in Seattle, but the Mariners were able to plate their first two runs after he took the mound in the fifth at 73 pitches. Cortes allowed two walks — including a four-pitch pass to lead off the inning — and RBI doubles to Ty France and Teoscar Hernandez in what ended up being his final frame of the night.
Despite the hiccups, Cortes completed the inning when he got Eugenio Suarez to whiff on a fastball.
“I thought Nestor was good again,” Aaron Boone said after the Yankees’ 10-2 win. “Ran into some trouble there in the fifth, but made a big pitch to get out of it, which I was happy to see him do that after the walk to the leadoff hitter on four pitches. That kind of put him in a bad spot in that inning, but he was able to right himself and really make a big pitch when he needed to make it to get through that fifth inning.”
Boone added that Cortes had a “crispy” fastball while totaling five hits, the two earned runs, three walks and six strikeouts over 101 pitches. The pitcher, meanwhile, only wanted the run-producing pitch to France back, as he thought Hernandez put a good swing on a tough backdoor slider.
Like his manager, Cortes found his inning-ending strikeout encouraging.
“Finishing that inning was huge,” Cortes said. “I think the stamina’s there. I felt strong. I felt like I could have kept going.”
The runs Cortes surrendered ultimately proved inconsequential, but he has had some issues around the 75-pitch mark and when he goes through an order for the third time. Cortes recently called that tendency “the story of my season,” and it has contributed to a 5.16 ERA for the southpaw.
That number went down on Tuesday, but Cortes owns a 14.67 ERA in the fifth inning or later this year. That’s the worst mark among all major league pitchers with a minimum of 10 innings, according to statistician Katie Sharp.
While Tuesday’s start hardly made for a poor performance, the Yankees need Cortes to remain effective later in games. The 2022 All-Star certainly expects that of himself, and Boone has remained confident that the trend will end.
“He’s a really good pitcher. He’ll be fine,” Boone said. “I wish everyone and you guys would stop asking me about it, because it does become this talking point all the time. He’s thrown the ball well the last few times. He hasn’t finished great, but he will.”
While Cortes will keep trying to improve at the end of starts, Aaron Judge continued his habit of clobbering baseballs — in general and in Seattle — on Tuesday.
He added another home run, a seventh-inning solo shot, after sending two balls over the wall on Monday. Judge now has 10 home runs over 18 career games at T-Mobile Park, and he’s hit 12 dingers over his last 16 games.
Judge’s 18 longballs trail only the Mets’ Pete Alonso (20) this year, and the Yankees’ captain ended May 30 with just as many home runs as he did last year when he hit a record-breaking 62 bombs. That’s all despite missing 10 games with a hip strain this year.
Prior to Judge’s blast, Anthony Volpe and Greg Allen also went deep. Isiah Kiner-Falefa, meanwhile, continued his successful stretch at the plate, recording a four-hit, four-RBI night.
“I’m feeling good,” Kiner-Falefa said. “I just feel like I’m getting good pitches to hit right now, and I’m able to hit the ball hard.
“I feel like this is what I can do. This is kind of what I expected to do. I worked my butt off to make adjustments.”
While the Yankees locked up a series win on Tuesday, the team placed Harrison Bader on the 10-day injured list with a low-grade hamstring strain. After the game, Boone said he expects the center fielder to miss “a couple weeks.”
The skipper will mix and match Allen, Kiner-Falefa and Judge in center with Bader out.
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