There were two balls hit to right field in the Yankees’ 14-7 loss to the Cardinals on Sunday afternoon that could’ve been caught by Juan Soto.
Well, they should’ve been caught by Soto.
The game turned out to be lopsided and others deserve even more of the blame, but both doubles turned out to be costly for the Yankees, allowing St. Louis to get on the board early and then begin to pull away late.
Soto’s first steps were in on a high fly ball from second baseman Brendan Donovan on the first pitch of the second inning. By the time Soto realized it was carrying deeper and toward the wall, it was too late. He even took his eyes off the ball as it was descending to check how close he was to the wall. Donovan wound up on second with a double and he came around to score three pitches later on an RBI single from right fielder Jordan Walker, his first of five hits.
“When he hit it, I thought it was going to be a high popup in the infield,” Soto said, “but the ball took off with the wind helping a little bit, pushing the ball even further to the wall. It ended up out of my reach.”
Boone mentioned that there was a tough sky above Yankee Stadium on Sunday because of the stormy weather passing through, so making immediate reads on balls in the air was more of a challenge. Soto insisted that he saw the ball all the way.
— Talkin' Yanks (@TalkinYanks) September 1, 2024
Later on, the Yankees erased a 7-2 deficit, tying the game in the sixth. St. Louis then loaded the bases and had two outs in the top of the seventh when No. 8 hitter Lars Nootbaar cracked a line drive to deep right.
Soto looked like he had a beat on it, ranging back, but he didn’t make it to the spot in time, flailing his arms up as the bases-clearing double bounced up against the wall. The Cardinals added two more runs that inning, pulling away.
NOOOOOOOOOT CLEARS THE BASES! pic.twitter.com/ZMOxHNCEhe
— St. Louis Cardinals (@Cardinals) September 1, 2024
Off the bat, Boone didn’t think it was catchable for Soto. He said Nootbaar stung it, hanging in on a changeup from Yankees reliever Tommy Kahnle at the bottom of the zone.
Soto was asked to walk through that play and he didn’t have too much to offer.
“He just hit a line drive,” he said. “He got good back spin. It went over my head.”
Again, it seemed like Soto got a poor jump on the play, taking a loopy route. It could’ve been a situation where he set up too shallow and needed to be deeper before contact, but in a tie game with less of a power threat in the box — as much as Nootbaar then homered off Ron Marinaccio in his next at-bat — Soto was likely setting himself up to make a throw home on a base hit and try to save a run.
The batter after Nootbaar — center fielder Victor Scott II — also lined a run-scoring double over Soto’s head, but that was a much tougher play. And considering the Yankees didn’t score again, it was the Nootbaar three-run double that provided the knockout punch.
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