An interminable rain delay before Sunday\u2019s game at Yankee Stadium was far from the ugliest part of the day for a team that entered as hot as any in the sport.<\/p>\n
The Yankees blew a three-run lead to the Marlins in a 7-6 defeat, as a bullpen filled with question marks imploded in the eighth inning and the lineup mostly disappeared after the third.<\/p>\n
Down by three runs in the bottom of the ninth, the Yankees rallied with walks by Cody Bellinger and Ben Rice.<\/p>\n
Giancarlo Stanton struck out looking before Jazz Chisholm Jr. doubled in the gap to right-center to get the Yankees to within a run.<\/p>\n
After an intentional walk to Austin Wells, J.C. Escarra pinch hit for Jos\u00e9 Caballero and struck out to end it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t think the game is over until the last out,\u201d Chisholm said of the late drama.<\/p>\n
The defeat was surprising, but what caused it wasn\u2019t, as even with the Yankees winning eight of their first nine games \u2014 and four in a row entering Sunday \u2014 there were some lingering questions.<\/p>\n
Jake Bird (59) reacts after giving Miami Marlins third baseman Graham Pauley (21) a two-run RBI double during the 8th inning of the Yankees and Miami Marlins game at Yankee Stadium. Bill Kostroun\/New York Post<\/p>\n
At the forefront was the pen, filled with pitchers with lackluster r\u00e9sum\u00e9s.<\/p>\n
And the lack of production from the bottom of the lineup has been alarming.<\/p>\n
Both were on display in the loss.<\/p>\n
Jake Bird and Ryan Yarbrough gave up run-scoring hits in the decisive eighth inning, but they weren\u2019t the only culprits.<\/p>\n
The game began well enough, as the Yankees brushed off an early run allowed by Max Fried \u2014 his first of the season \u2014 with Rice\u2019s three-run homer in the bottom of the inning.<\/p>\n
It was Rice\u2019s third home run in his past four games.<\/p>\n
The 410-foot blast into the second deck in right came against Pete Fairbanks, who opened the game because he had to return to Miami for his wife\u2019s induced labor Monday.<\/p>\n
The bizarre strategy backfired early, as Fairbanks was terrible in the first, but Yankees hitters hardly did anything once he left.<\/p>\n
They scraped together an unearned run in the third to make it 4-1 against Miami\u2019s scheduled starter, Chris Paddack.<\/p>\n
New York Yankees first baseman Ben Rice (22) watches his three-run homer during the first inning of the Yankees and Miami Marlins game at Yankee Stadium. Bill Kostroun\/New York Post<\/p>\n
And with Fried on the mound \u2014 having pitched 13 \u00b9\/\u2083 shutout innings to open the season \u2014 that seemed like it would be enough.<\/p>\n
But Fried wasn\u2019t sharp and lamented the three walks he issued, as he allowed three runs in 6 \u00b2\/\u2083 innings.<\/p>\n
Miami got a run back in the fourth and inched closer in the sixth, as the first three runners reached \u2014 including on a throwing error by Caballero on Heriberto Hern\u00e1ndez\u2019s grounder to short.<\/p>\n
Fried picked off Hern\u00e1ndez at first and then Caballero made up for his miscue by throwing out Lopez at the plate on Connor Norby\u2019s ground ball.<\/p>\n
Max Fried (54) throws a pitch during the 5th inning of the Yankees and Miami Marlins game at Yankee Stadium. Bill Kostroun\/New York Post<\/p>\n
Giancarlo Stanton (27) hits a single during the 7th inning when the New York Yankees played the Miami Marlins Sunday, April 5, 2026 at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, NY. Robert Sabo for NY Post<\/p>\n
Home plate umpire Manny Gonzalez missed the call despite Wells clearly tagging Lopez\u2019s elbow, but a replay review overturned it to preserve the Yankees lead.<\/p>\n
But the game came apart in the eighth.<\/p>\n
With the bullpen short after being used heavily, the Yankees went to Bird with one on and one out in the eighth.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGo beyond the box score with the Bombers\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Yankees by Greg Joyce, exclusively on Sports+.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Bird walked Lopez, hit pinch hitter Griffin Conine and then gave up a two-run, go-ahead double to pinch hitter Graham Pauley.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have to bear down and I didn\u2019t do my job,\u201d Bird said. \u201cJust not a good day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Down a run, the lefty Yarbrough entered and allowed a single to Xavier Edwards to make it a three-run game.<\/p>\n
It proved to be too much for the Yankees to come back from.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An interminable rain delay before Sunday\u2019s game at Yankee Stadium was far from the ugliest part of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":220239,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[43506,99577,123,125,3822,124,3817,3821,110],"class_list":{"0":"post-220238","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-aaron-judge","9":"tag-max-fried","10":"tag-miami","11":"tag-miami-headlines","12":"tag-miami-marlins","13":"tag-miami-news","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-new-york-yankees","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220238"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220238\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220239"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}