Gleyber Torres’ baserunning blunder costly to Yankees

NEW YORK — Gleyber Torres rose slowly from the chalky dirt, having landed a few feet shy of returning to the safety of third base. The momentum created by a few timely swings had vanished, leaving the Yankees’ infielder to ponder how quickly a situation could shift.

Representing the tying run, Torres was tagged out in a key rundown play during the seventh inning on Tuesday evening, short-circuiting a budding rally. A Colton Cowser homer soon tilted the score back in the Orioles’ favor, sending the Yankees to a 5-3 loss at Yankee Stadium.

“When it comes down to it, stuff like that can’t happen,” said Yankees captain Aaron Judge. “We can’t keep shooting ourselves in the foot with mistakes like that on the basepaths. But it happened, and we’ve got to move on and get ready for tomorrow.”

The Yankees had been limited to Judge’s Major League-leading 56th home run through six innings, with Dean Kremer working five of those frames.

Anthony Rizzo touched Cionel Pérez for a one-out ground-rule double, and Alex Verdugo legged out a two-out infield single that prompted Baltimore to call upon Yennier Cano.

Torres greeted the right-hander with his third hit of the game, a ground-rule double that hopped the right-field fence and brought home Rizzo to cut the deficit to 4-2.

Four pitches later, Soto ripped a hard single to right field that brought in Verdugo. That was where the trouble began.

Anthony Santander came up firing from right field, delivering a one-hop throw to home plate. Third-base coach Luis Rojas had held Torres, but Soto was digging for second base as Santander’s throw traveled in.

That prompted Torres to break for home.

“It was a big play,” Torres said. “I just tried to protect Soto, but I feel like I have to be a little more aggressive. If I’m going to make that decision, go straight for the run. I think that’s going to be my mistake.”

Catcher Adley Rutschman fired to second base, where shortstop Gunnar Henderson snapped a throw back to the plate. Torres halted halfway down the baseline, soon to be tagged out in a 9-2-6-2-5-2-6 pickle.

“I think he thought Soto was going to be out,” manager Aaron Boone said. “But you’ve got to commit. Once Rutschman squares [to throw], either you’re going to sell out to go or bluff him and pull off. He got caught in between.”

It was the sixth out that Torres has made at home plate this season, which ties the Rays’ Yandy Díaz for the most in the Majors.

“A handful of those are two-out, bang-bang plays on aggressive sends,” Boone said. “It’s important to have context with that. He does make some mistakes on the bases. He’s cleaned it up a lot from last year and the year before, where he was getting himself in trouble a lot.

“He’s toned down some of the aggressiveness. But I also think tonight is a case of protecting a runner, too.”

The play ended the inning with Judge due up, though Baltimore likely would have intentionally walked Judge with first base open had all the runners been safe.

“It might have been just a little miscommunication,” Judge said. “He was hustling the whole way. I think he wanted to score and he got the stop sign. It’s just kind of no-man’s-land right there.”