Add The New York Post on Google CHICAGO — The bullpen was long expected to be an area the Yankees would need to address by the trade deadline, but on the way there, their relief corps became a pleasant surprise.
Five days away from the deadline, though, an overworked group had a rare bad night.
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In a game where two of the Yankees’ best relievers were believed to be unavailable because of recent workload concerns, Paul Blackburn gave up a pair of home runs on back-to-back pitches in the eighth inning, turning a three-run lead into a tie game.
Ryan Yarbrough, the fifth Yankees reliever of the night and seemingly last one available, gave up a walk-off single to Edgar Quero, handing them a wild and crushing 6-5 loss to the White Sox on Wednesday night at Rate Field.
The Yankees loaded the bases with one out in the top of the 12th, but Ben Rice struck out and Ali Sánchez grounded out to end the threat.
Then, after the White Sox sacrifice bunted the automatic runner to third, Quero lifted a single to center to end it.
The Yankees (61-47), who are now 1-7 in extra-inning games this season, fell to 2 ¹/₂ games back of the Rays for first place in the AL East.
They will try to still win the four-game series against the White Sox (56-51).
Playing so many close games of late in large part because of their offense’s inability to blow things open, the Yankees have had to ask a lot of their bullpen.
On Wednesday, that meant not having David Bednar, Brent Headrick and Angel Chivilli available after each had thrown on back-to-back days (and Bednar four of the last five).
Anthony Volpe had put the Yankees ahead 5-4 in the top of the 11th with a pinch-hit sacrifice fly.
And then Camilo Doval, who has been a disappointment for most of the season, got two quick outs on a pair of ground balls aided by his defense — first a terrific pick by Paul Goldschmidt on Doval’s throw to first base and then a nifty sliding stop by Ryan McMahon.
But on a 2-0 pitch to Andrew Benintendi, Sánchez tried to back-pick Munetaka Murakami at third base, only for his throw to bounce past McMahon, allowing Murakami to score the tying run.
Doval went on to walk Benintendi on four pitches and Braden Montgomery on five before getting a groundout to escape the frame.
Tim Hill had entered for the bottom of the 10th and, despite some recent struggles, came through in the clutch. After the lefty’s wild pitch allowed the automatic runner to take third with no outs, the Yankees brought Max Schuemann in from left field to use a five-man infield, which finally paid dividends.
Hill got Edgar Quero and pinch hitter Randal Grichuk, a lefty killer, to both ground out to shortstop José Caballero, who was shaded over toward third base with Schuemann on his left.
Then Hill struck out Murakami, who had delivered the game-tying blast off Blackburn, to extend the game.
Earlier in the night, Cam Schlittler was terrific yet again, tossing 6 ¹/₃ innings of one-run ball while striking out eight. He carried a one-hit shutout into the seventh inning before his command betrayed him late and put a sour taste in his mouth as he walked off the mound.
Schlittler walked Murakami on a full count to lead off the seventh, hit Miguel Vargas with a 98 mph sinker and then gave up an RBI double to Benintendi, at which point Aaron Boone went to the bullpen.
Fernando Cruz came on and got the final two outs while stranding both runners — he has now stranded 34 of 39 inherited runners this season.
Cruz came back out for the eighth and gave up a leadoff double before getting the first out and then handing the ball off to Blackburn for the top of the order.
Blackburn came into the night having pitched to a 0.92 ERA in 25 games since May 16.
But he threw a 1-1 fastball at the top of the zone to Sam Antonacci, who crushed it to right field for a two-run shot that pulled the White Sox within 4-3.
Murakami came up next and pounced on a first-pitch curveball just below the zone, sending it into the left field seats to tie the game.
Spencer Jones had crushed a three-run shot to put the Yankees ahead 4-0 before Schlittler even took the mound, allowing him to go on the attack and cruise through the White Sox lineup.
But the Yankees missed late opportunities to add to that lead, including having a runner at third with one out in the sixth and seventh innings but failing to score each time.
