Had it not been for Jung Hoo Lee, the Yankees may have won their weekend series against the Giants. Carlos Rodón might have enjoyed his fourth start of the season, and the home fans may have left Yankee Stadium with smiles on their faces Sunday. Alas, Lee very much played a part in the three-game s et, hitting a three-run homer in Friday’s opener before adding two more longballs off an otherwise stellar Rodón in a 5-4 rubber match win for the Giants on Sunday afternoon. Lee’s first dinger of the finale only put one run on the board in the fourth frame after Rodón left a 3-2 slider over the middle. However, the outfielder added another three-run shot in the sixth inning on a 1-2 curveball that hung at the top of the zone. “Good hitter. Hit my mistakes. First at-bat, I got him on a slider in zone. Second at-bat, he hammered that slider. Missed the execution on that,” Rodón said, recalling his battles with Lee. “Third at-bat, we went hard. Started with hard sinkers, four-seam, and then just terrible execution on a curveball that he punished. “It’s not good enough.” Starting catcher J.C. Escarra added that the curveball was supposed to be down in the zone. “He hadn’t seen the curveball all game,” Escarra said. “We wanted to get him chasing and punch him out.” Prior to Lee’s second lefty-on-lefty crime, a soft Christian Koss single went under Anthony Volpe’s glove. Rodón, a Giant in 2022, then walked Willy Adames. The free pass made for a callback to Rodón’s last start against the Tigers, as two walks preceded a three-run homer from Andy Ibáñez that day. After that game, Rodón said that he was “tired of walking people.” He expressed similar sentiments after walking three on Sunday, stating that falling behind hitters has been “frustrating.” “Not much you can do on the infield single there,” manager Aaron Boone said. “But then the walk ahead of the homer, it’s that small of a separator between him being in a dominant position right now to — the reality is he’s throwing the ball incredibly well. It’s that next level of avoiding that ball that today is one ball.” Boone added that Rodón’s command was a “tick off.” Still, the manager praised the pitcher after an outing hurt by walks and homers for the second straight start. “I thought he was excellent and [made] a critical mistake with runners on,” Boone said after Rodón also tallied 5.2 innings, three hits, four earned runs, eight strikeouts and 100 pitches. “It’s really one pitch that hurt his outing.” The fact of the matter is that Rodón has made a habit of making mistakes at inopportune times, even in games where he’s displayed dominance. He has now surrendered five home runs this season and is pitching to a 5.48 ERA. Rodón has given up 51 homers in 50 total starts for the Yankees. That figure leads the majors since his Yankees debut on July 7, 2023. “His stuff is prone to the longball,” Boone said. “So, especially in certain situations, preventing that as best we can is a challenge.” Be that as it may, the Yankees need more from their $162 million man, especially with Gerrit Cole out for the year. “I wouldn’t say that’s really crossed my mind much,” Rodón said when asked about the implications of Cole’s absence. “I’m just focusing on giving my best effort out there and trying to win ballgames.” Carlos Rodon has allowed 51 home runs with the Yankees. That's tied with JA Happ for the most in any player's first 50 games with the Yankees. — New York Yankees Stats (@nyyankeesstats) April 13, 2025 With Rodón out of the game, San Francisco pushed another run across in the seventh after Casey Schmitt led the inning off with a double. He then scored as Koss benefitted from some more iffy defense: a fielding error from Paul Goldschmidt. Goldschmidt started the scoring back in the first inning, picking up an RBI single against Giants ace Logan Webb after Aaron Judge doubled off the center field wall. The Yankees added two more runs in the second on an Escarra double – the first RBI of his career – and a Ben Rice single. Jazz Chisholm Jr., snapping an 0-for-24 skid, then ripped a solo homer in the eighth, but it was too little, too late for the Yankees. “I’ve been barreling a lot of balls up over the past week,” Chisholm said. “They just haven’t been falling, and that’s just what baseball is. You can hit a million balls at 100 mph and get zero hits out of it. So I’m just happy to see that luck is finally turning around.” With the Bombers finally done with a National League-heavy early-season schedule, a rematch from the 2024 American League Division Series awaits. A three-game series with the Royals begins on Monday. Seth Lugo, the AL Cy Young runner-up last season, will start the opener for Kansas City. Michael Wacha and Kris Bubic will follow. Carlos Carrasco and Max Fried will start the first two games for the Yankees. Fried has been the pinstripers’ only dependable starter thus far, but they’re hoping he’ll have some help when Clarke Schmidt makes his season debut on Wednesday. ...read more read less