BALTIMORE — Carlos Rodon finally made the necessary adjustment on Sunday to avoid his first-inning woes. But the left-hander was still not fully able to pitch like the Yankees need him to. Rodon gave up only two runs but lasted just four innings because of a high pitch count before the Yankees fell to the Orioles 6-5 in brutal fashion at Camden Yards.
Having been hurt recently by his early dependence on his fastball and slider — leading to a 9.00 ERA in the first inning entering Sunday — Rodon mixed his pitches from the start against the Orioles. He did not throw a fastball until his 12th pitch of the game and only threw four heaters (compared to eight sliders, three curveballs and two change-ups) in a 1-2-3, 17-pitch first inning.
“It was a little bizarre at first, but just wanted to show I could throw sliders and breaking balls and show the fastball late,” Rodon said. “Got some swing and miss on some fastball [after] showing that breaking stuff earlier.” The problem on Sunday came in the next three frames as the Orioles forced him to throw 81 pitches from the second through fourth innings and 98 overall.
One of those was a 1-2 slider over the plate that Gunnar Henderson crushed for a two-run homer. “Obviously wanted to go deeper in the game there with the stuff I had, but they had some good at-bats, they had some long at-bats,” Rodon said. “Just can be better with the breaking stuff in the zone and then getting ahead and limiting the pitch count.
” Jose.
