TORONTO — Woe, Canada.
In front of a sold-out Canada Day crowd waiting to erupt at Rogers Centre, the Yankees served as fodder with a second straight late-game implosion on Tuesday.
This one came in a five-run seventh inning and again included a critical catcher’s interference, with George Springer delivering the decisive blow on a grand slam off Luke Weaver as the Yankees got walloped by the Blue Jays 12-5 in a holiday matinee.
Springer, who homered twice on the day and finished with seven RBIs, may never have to pay for Tim Horton’s the rest of his career.
With the win, the Blue Jays (47-38) inched within one game of the Yankees (48-37), who lost for the 12th time in their past 18 games, while the Rays had a chance to move within a half-game when they played on Tuesday night.
“We’re not playing our best baseball by any means,” Weaver said. “All of our facets got to line up. It’s part of the game, where you hope to click on all three facets [hitting, pitching and defense]. You hope that two out of three holds you strong for a while. We’ve just run into a buzz saw where we’re not quite doing that as well as we’d like to.
“The concern is not necessarily high, in my opinion. We got a great offense, great pitching and great fundamentals out there on the field. It’s going to click together. … Just got to catch a heater and go on some runs.”
The Yankees went 2-for-17 with runners in scoring position, a recurring issue during this downturn, their defense let them down for a second straight game and their bullpen got hit around once again.
Not even Max Fried, who has thrived as a stopper this season, could get the Yankees back on track Tuesday as he gave up four runs over six innings in a rare off game.
“I have concerns of everything when we’re going great, when we’re not, and everything in between,” manager Aaron Boone said. “I try to evaluate it not emotionally every day. The last two nights, with runners in scoring position, feel like we’ve swung the bat pretty well and haven’t got results.”
After a sloppy, four-run bottom of the sixth cost the Yankees on Monday night, the Blue Jays returned the favor on Tuesday with a pair of errors in the top of the seventh that tied the game at 4-4.
But Mark Leiter Jr., who took the loss on Monday (though he received little help behind him), relieved Fried (at 99 pitches) in the bottom of the seventh and put a pair of runners on with one out.
Boone got aggressive and called in Weaver, who appeared to get pinch hitter Addison Barger looking at Strike 3 on a full count. But Barger contested that he hit catcher J.C. Escarra’s glove on his check swing, so the Blue Jays challenged, with replay review confirming Escarra’s second catcher’s interference in as many days, both times loading the bases.
“It’s on me,” said Escarra, starting a second straight game while Austin Wells recovered from testing for a finger circulation issue. “I intend to get as close as possible, but obviously not letting that happen. I was too close today. I didn’t help my team win today, or [Monday]. It shouldn’t happen. But it’s something I can control. But I was too deep in there trying to steal that low strike.”
This time, it was followed by Ernie Clement roping a ground ball into the shortstop hole, past the dive of Anthony Volpe, to put the Blue Jays up 5-4.
The roof was open on Tuesday, but if it had been closed, Springer would have popped it off as he came up next and crushed a grand slam that blew the game open.
“You run into a bad pitch there to a guy that’s having a nice day and the game gets away from you,” Weaver said.
Springer’s first home run had cut the Yankees lead to 2-1 in the fourth inning. Two outs later, Davis Schneider hit a weak chopper to third base that Jazz Chisholm Jr. did not play overly aggressive. He had to wait for a hop and then threw off target to first, where Schneider reached on an infield single.
That ended up proving costly. Fried walked the next batter, Myles Straw, on five pitches and then Andrés Giménez got just enough of a sinker down the middle to sneak a three-run homer over the fence in center field for the 4-2 lead.
“We’ve obviously got to play a little bit better,” Boone said of his defense, adding that the Yankees would “talk through” the possibility of moving Chisholm back to second base and DJ LeMahieu to third. “We have the people capable of doing that and we’ll continue to work hard at it. We’ve got to play better overall, we understand that and know that.”