Yanks seek faster starts after humbling from familiar faces

MINNEAPOLIS -- There were no doubt howls of disapproval hurled toward television sets in the tri-state area when Aaron Hicks attempted to bunt for a hit with two outs and no one on in the third inning on Monday, but Aaron Judge didn’t hate the idea. The Yankees are searching for a spark.

Hicks’ gamble didn’t pan out, and the Yankees were unable to touch Sonny Gray, who handcuffed his former team over seven scoreless innings. Judge said after New York’s 6-1 loss to the Twins that his team needs to be hitting the gas pedal sooner.

“We’ve got to try to jump out early on teams, score early and put the pressure on them,” Judge said. “Right now, we’re kind of taking a while getting into the game, feeling it and not doing the job. We’ve got to jump on them early, and that starts tomorrow.”

The Yanks have been held to six runs through their past four games, and only a ninth-inning spurt saved them from suffering what would have been their first shutout loss of the year. Gray carved through his old club, striking out eight while permitting just three hits.

“Sonny’s throwing the ball great,” manager Aaron Boone said. “It’s kind of more of the same of what he’s been doing all year. That being said, we’re the Yankees and we’ve got to find a way to do a little better than all that.”

Gray was a front-line starter when the Athletics dealt him to the Yankees in 2017, but it never clicked for him in New York. Gray clashed with the coaching staff over pitch selection, going 15-16 with a 4.51 ERA in 41 games (34 starts).

He reclaimed success with the Reds and the Twins, for whom he has gone 3-0 with an 0.62 ERA in five starts this year. Judge said that Gray’s improved command of his cutter makes for the biggest difference, compared to the 2017-18 version of Gray.

“Back when we had him, he had great feel for his slider and curveball and sinker combo, using both sides of the plate,” Judge said. “But now he mixes that cutter in there to keep you honest. You can’t lean out over the middle of the plate on the slider or hunt the fastball, because he’ll throw that cutter in there, any time, any count.”

When Joey Gallo was acquired from the Rangers in 2021, the forecast was that his boom-or-bust swing could deposit plenty of balls into Yankee Stadium’s short right-field porch. A .159 hitter in 140 games as a Yankee, Gallo was offloaded to the Dodgers for Minor League right-hander Clayton Beeter last August.

He’s swinging the bat better for the Twins; Gallo’s 432-foot homer, his sixth of the year, came off reliever Greg Weissert in the fourth inning after rookie Jhony Brito permitted three runs on three hits and three walks over 2 2/3 innings.

“I think [New York] was very tough on him,” Boone said of Gallo. “I think it absolutely wore on him. It was a real deal of a thing. But I respected how he handled it; he never ran from it, never wanted out of the lineup. As best he could, he faced it and owned it. I know what a tough time it was in his life and the challenges he faced, but he had my respect in that he always continued to fight.”

Brito’s evening lasted a bit longer than his April 13 start at Yankee Stadium, when he permitted seven runs to the Twins in two-thirds of an inning, but he was once again unable to cleanly dispatch hitters.

He threw 30 pitches in the second inning and 37 more in the third, chased after permitting a two-run Jorge Polanco single, a run-scoring Byron Buxton groundout on a comebacker and a walk to Trevor Larnach.

“You can’t let that get to you,” Brito said. “When you get hit with two strikes, you’ve just got to be better at executing the pitch, expanding the zone at the right time and making sure you get them out.”