Devin Williams implodes once again as the Yankees drop game one 4-3 to the Padres

New York—The Yankees started a new series tonight against the red-hot San Diego Padres, who came in on a five-game winning streak. It looked like the Yankees were in a good spot to snap their two-game losing streak, but Devin Williams imploded late yet again.  Carlos Rodon took the ball for the Yankees, and Nick Pivetta got the start for the Padres. 

In the top of the first inning, Rodon retired the Padres in order thanks to a beautiful catch in left field from Cody Bellinger. Rodon also picked up his first two strikeouts of the ballgame on some nasty sliders. 

In the bottom of the first, Aaron Judge worked a one-out walk, then Ben Rice followed that up with a double down the first base line, but Judge was thrown out trying to go home on a bobble by Padres shortstop Xander Bogaerts. 

Rodon picked up his fourth and fifth strikeout of the game to help work around a leadoff single in the top of the third. 

Jorbit Vivas worked a leadoff walk in the bottom of the third inning then Trent Grisham launched a two-run home run into the second deck in right field against his fromer team to make it 2-0 Yankees. 

Some miscommunication from the Yankees' infield allowed the Padres to pick up a two-out single, but Rodon worked out of trouble in the top of the fourth inning. 

Cody Bellinger worked a leadoff walk in the bottom of the fourth, then immediately stole second base. A couple of batters later, Oswald Perazza worked a two-out walk, then the game went into a rain delay. Then, after a 30-minute rain delay, Jorbit Vivas struck out to strand two runners on base. 

Rodon remained in the game after the delay and retired the Padres in order to make this ballgame official in the top half of the fifth inning.

In the bottom of the sixth inning, Paul Goldschmidt singled to left field, knocking Pivetta out of the game. Then Goldy stole second base and moved up to third on a throwing error from Padres catcher Elias Diaz. Volpe took advantage of the error by picking up a sacrifice fly to make it a 3-0 game. 

Rodon had retired eight in a row before surrendering a one-out walk in the top of the seventh. A couple batters later, the Padres picked up a two-out single to knock Rodon out of the game. Fernando Cruz replaced Rodon on the mound and picked up the final out thanks to some help from a nice play from Wells behind the plate. 

Carlos Rodon’s final line: 6.2 innings pitched, three hits allowed, zero earned runs, one walk, and five strikeouts on 95 pitches. Rodon threw his fastball 46% of the time, the slider 21%, the changeup 21%, the sinker 7%, and the curveball 4% of the time. Rodon has been dominant over his last four starts, giving up just two runs in 25.2 innings with 29 strikeouts in that stretch to lower his ERA to 2.96 on the season. 

“Yeah, I mean, it's definitely a strong lineup. Some great hitters in that lineup,” Rodon said. “Wells was great tonight. I'm just rolling with him. We featured a lot of change-up, and I just tried to get ahead and let the defense make plays; they did well.”

In the top of the eighth inning, Devin Williams came in and replaced Cruz on the mound and worked into trouble, but did strike out Fernando Tatis, leading to Tatis and Padres manager Mike Schildt to get ejected. Luke Weaver replaced Williams on the mound with the bases loaded and served up a two-run double to Manny Machado, followed by a two-run single from Xander Bogaerts to make it a 4-3 Padres lead. 

“Yeah, it was just set up for Devin there,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said when asked if he considered keeping Cruz in the game. “Cruz had thrown two innings two days ago, so I wanted not to overuse him there and keep everyone in playing moving forward.” 

Devin Williams talked about his performance postgame. 

“To be honest with you, I felt pretty good, obviously the rain started to pick up there and I wasn't able to make the adjustment.” Williams said, “It was the landing spot, to be honest with you, I couldn't figure it out with the release point on my fastball, and it was getting away from me.” 

Tim Hill replaced Weaver on the mound in the top of the ninth and worked a 1-2-3 inning. 

In the bottom of the ninth, Anthony Volpe, Austin Wells, and Jasson Dominguez went down in order against the Padres' closer Robert Suarez to drop another heartbreaker, thanks to Devin Williams. 

The Yankees will look to bounce back tomorrow with Clarke Schmidt on the mound. They will face former Yankee Michael King for the Padres. The first pitch will be at 7:05 p.m. ET on the YES Network. 

My thoughts on the game: Worthless Williams did it again, blowing another game as he has now given up 13 earned runs this season, the same amount of runs he gave up in 2023-24 combined. Williams can not be trusted in big spots; that is now the fifth game the Yankees have lost going into the eighth inning or later with a lead this season. There was never any reason Williams should have even been in that game after Cruz only faced one batter and threw two pitches in the seventh inning—an unfortunate way to start a series, and waste a gem from Carlos Rodon. There is not much more to say about this game. It is another very frustrating loss, yet again, as the Yankees drop their third in a row; they have to bounce back tomorrow.